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3 @ 

STORIES FOR YOUNG PEOPLE. 

BY KEY. EDWABD A. BAND. 

Look Ahead Series. 4 Vols. Price, $1.25 each. 

MAKING THE BEST OP IT j or, Tumble Up 
Tom. 

UP NORTH IN A WHALER ; OR, Would He 
Keep His Colors Flying ? 

TOO LATE FOR THE tIdE-MILL. 

OUR CLERK PROM BARKTON. 

Fighting the Sea Series. 4 Vols. Price, $1.25 Each. 

FIGHTING THE SEA; OR, Winter at the 
Life-Saving Station. 

A CANDLE IN THE SEA; or, Winter at 
Seal’s Head. 

THE MILL AT SANDY CREEK. (For Girls.) 
A SALT WATER HERO. 


THOMAS WHITTAKER, 

2 AND 3 Bible House, NEW YORK. 

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A SALT 

WATER HERO 


BY 


/ 


REV. EDWARD AUGUSTUS RAND 

AUTHOR OF 

“ FIGHTING THE SEA,” ‘‘ UP NORTH IN A WHALER,” ETC. 




SE- 




3m l0rfe 

THOMAS WHITTAKER 

2 AND 3 Bible House 


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COPYRIGHT 1894 

By THOMAS WHITTAKER 


CONTENTS 


Chapter. Page. 

I. Leaving Home, .... i 

II. Off on the Water, . . ^ . *13 

III. Among the Icebergs, ... 25 

IV. Whales! Whales I . . . -34 

V. A Bear Hunt, .... 42 

VI. The Capsized Kayak, . . *57 

VH. Nipped, . . . . . 71 

VIII. Lost on the Ice-Field, . . *87 

IX. What Became of Him, . . .104 

X. A Flut'per in the Waters- Home, . 522 

XI. Had Rather Dig, . . .146 

XH. Would They Hire Him? . . .164 

XIH. The Mysterious Cousin Charles, . 179 

*• XIV. One Sunday, at Church, . . . 205 

XV. A Robber in the Night, . . 226 

XVI. The Arrest, ..... 240 
XVH. In His Cell, .... 256 

XVIII. An Arrival, ..... 262 

XIX. His Own Story, .... 266 

XX. A Villain’s Villainy, . .281 

XXI. Homeward Bound! . . . 296 

XXH. Home at Last ! . . . . 309 

XXIII. A Certain Celebration, . . 320 



A SALT WATER HERO. 


CHAPTER I. 

LEAVING HOME. 

OU might go out into the shed-chamber 



and see if any fish is there. You know 


you will want to see the place once more.” 

Was Joe’s mother crying? He caught a 
glimpse of her blue eyes, looking now like 
the sea when the mist clouds it. 

■ “ She feels my going, I suppose,” said Joe, 
stepping out of the kitchen door upon a short, 
decaying plank-walk that led to the small, 
black-walled shed. By the side of a small 
wood-pile (in the Waters’ shed, there never was 
a large wood-pile) ran a short stairway to a 
second floor. This floor was of wood ; the 
first was of earth. Between the two floors, 
there was not as much space as was desirable, 
and Joe’s father was often complaining that 
he had not sufficient room for the swinging of 
his axe by the side of that small wood-pile 


2 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


All disadvantages are apt to have their 
compensating side, and in this case the compen- 
sation was a short stairway up to the shed-cham- 
ber. Joe quickly reached the chamber and 
exclaimed, “ There ! just what you might have 
expected in this house ! — a string, but no fish 
hanging from it ! ’* 

Joe gave a melancholy look at the string 
dangling from its nail but not carrying any 
fish, and said, ‘‘ Good appetites in this house, 
and not much to satisfy them ! Mother was 
going to give me baked potatoes and stripped 
salt fish for my supper, as I like them and it 
might be my last here, but she and Angel will 
have to think of something else. Glad I am 
going to sea, where fish are plenty. Mother 
thought I would like to see the place once 
more. Not much to see ! 

Very little was there to be seen, unless one 
went to a window which looked down a lane 
leading to several wharves, to a dock, to a 
coal-vessel, two fishing schooners, and the 
staunch though old-fashioned whaler in which 
Joe expected to make a run, not to, but 
towards the North Pole. This whaler was a 
vigorous female by the name of the Ann 
Batten. Joe’s father did not have a lofty 
station in life. He was the servant of the 


LEAVING HOME. 


3 


town and did various things — looking after the 
town hall, in which were the different town 
offices, acting as a kind of messenger for the 
selectmen, posting notices, and leaving at 
the houses warnings of town-meetings. He 
might have fared better in life if he had had 
a definite occupation, but, not educating him- 
self to do anything definite by way of a pursuit, 
he was obliged in after life to take anything 
that came along. However, a Samson cannot 
be hidden, no matter how many prison-houses 
you put him into. Mr. Sidney Waters, Joe’s 
father, felt that life surrounded him with many 
unfair restrictions, but all these could not con- 
fine the inward greatness of Mr. Sidney Waters. 
He would come up to this shed-chamber, sit 
down by this window and while busy with 
some effort in mending or making, indulge in 
wonderful dreams of a great future, of some- 
thing always coming. Sitting by this window 
and watching the Ann Batten one day, he 
conceived the idea that Joe might like to go 
to sea ; that Joe might become a Nimrod in 
hunting whales; that Joe might bring home 
such quantities of whalebone that “ Waters & 
Son ” might start a whalebone factory and 
the family be raised from poverty to wealth. 

Joe, how would you like to go to sea?” 


4 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


said his father, dreamily, to him one day. An 
unimportant question, apparently, but it 
proved to be a corner in Joe’s life. 

“ I think I should like it, father, and the old 
Ann Batten looks as if she might have a lot 
of fun in her,” said Joe. 

That was the way it all began. 

To-morrow Joe expected to sail in the Ann 
Batten, and this visit to the shed-chamber 
would probably be the last before the voyage. 
With a sentimental interest, he now looked 
round on the dingy little place where on rainy 
days he had played “ store ” with other boys, 
or in fair weather watched the blue tides that, 
night and day, with strong, swift, noiseless feet 
ran to and from the sea, carrying on their 
patient backs of crystal many such burdens as 
barks, fishing-schooners, occasional steamers 
and big ships, and very many dories and scows. 

“ Well, good-bye ! ” said Joe, turning to go 
down-stairs. “ The next time I come, I hope 
to find some fish here.” Joe reported the 
utterly destitute condition of the shed-larder, 
adding, ** Oh dear ! it’s always so ! ” 

“Don’t you worry, Joe!” cried out his 
sister Angel, a contraction for Angelina — and, 
whether called by the short or long name, a 
kind of celestial being each time. If a family 


LEAVING HOME. 


5 


rent were closed, if somebody must sit up 
with the sick, if there were any difficult duty 
outside, like calling at a neighbor’s to regret a 
misunderstanding, if somebody found his coat 
darned because somebody else mending it 
burned a lamp late at night, it was probably 
Angel that closed, that sat up, that regretted, 
that mended. Mrs. Waters was much of an 
invalid, and Angel’s unfailing health, robust 
cheerfulness, alert but not disagreeable decis- 
ion, went to the front, at once. “ Don’t you 
worry, Joe!” called out Angel again. “I 
saved up a dozen smoked herring, thinking we 
might have them for your breakfast ; but 
we can have them for supper, and you like 
them, you know.” 

“ Oh, Angel, you are a blessing ! ” said Joe. 

I guess it is just as well to have them to- 
night, for I may be off before breakfast.” 

His mother sighed. 

“You think so, Joey?” asked Angel very 
soberly. 

“ Captain Grimes said this forenoon, if the 
wind shifted a little, we might go any time,” 
replied Joe. “ Of course, we don’t go at 
midnight, folks, but the cap’n said we might be 
off soon after seven. He is going to send Bill 
Stevens round to drum us up early, in that case.” 


6 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Here Joe carelessly drummed on the table 
and sang, sailor-like, — 

“ When the wind was blowing fair 
I bade my love good-bye." 

** That means you, Angel,” he said, in a low 
tone. “ Oh, I do wish, Angel, you were going ! 
I should be perfectly happy.” 

Small Sammy Waters heard Joe. “ You 
can’t have her, Joe,” said Sammy. “ Can he, 
Kitty ? ” Here he appealed to his sister, a 
year and a half older than he. 

“No,” replied Kitty, “he can’t have Angel, 
but he can take Nat Perry.” 

Angel blushed at this, for Nat Perry, people 
thought, might sometime want an Angel in 
his home. 

“ Well,” replied Joe, “ next to Angel, I 
wish Nat Perry was going. Nat’s a good 
sailor, and a first-rate fellow, but he is down on 
the Banks, they say, and I can’t expect to 
take him.” 

“Your chest all ready, Joe?” inquired his 
father, a man whose face implied intelligence, 
and yet a man having an air that led you to 
wonder if he had the faculty of putting his 
knowledge to the most profitable use practi- 
cally. 


LEAVING HOME. J 

“ All ready, father, and I wheeled her down 
to the ship this noon.’' 

Yes, and his mother at the time had gone up- 
stairs and cried, as she watched the careless, 
whistling Joe all the way down the lane to 
the old whaler. 

“ He don’t seem to mind it — can’t help — 
loving him,” she blubbered. “ Oh dear, there ! 
I almost forgot one thing. I’ll give him my 
prayer-book. He has a Bible.” 

All ready for the trip ? ” asked his father 
again. 

“ Yes, father.” 

It’s pretty long, you know, Joe.” 

Here Joe’s mother went into the kitchen- 
closet, pretending to pick up the scanty stock 
of crockery and bring it out for supper, but 
really that she might have a chance to stuff 
her handkerchief into her eyes. When she 
came out, her eyes made you think of the two 
faded, pinkish saucers she was bringing to the 
table. 

I think when you get to Newfoundland, — 
St. John’s, you know, Joe, — I may have a 
surprise for you.” 

“ You, father? Oh, thank you ! ” 

A surprise ! What could it be ? The children 
began to guess, but did not long try to solve 


8 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


this riddle. Their father was in the habit of 
making great promises that came to something 
else than he intended, like the gourds which 
one may cultivate for squashes in anticipation 
of Thanksgiving. It did not really pay to 
give much attention to his big propositions. 
He himself thought highly of his engagement 
to astonish Joe at St. John’s. 

“ A surprise, boy, a surprise, you know ! ” 
was the last thing he said before going to bed 
that night, and as he spoke he fondly tapped 
Joe on the shoulder. 

Joe laughed, and said, “Thank you,” but 
to himself he declared, “ Guess father’s sur- 
prise will be like the string out in the shed- 
chamber — no fish on it ! ” 

The next morning, when the sun was making 
a great fuss in the eastern sky, throwing all 
the clouds into a flaming excitement as he 
started to kindle his dazzling morning fires 
before their very eyes, there was a loud 
pounding at the humble door of the Waters 
family. 

“Who’s there?” cried Father Waters, run- 
ning in white from his bed to the window of 
his chamber overlooking the sidewalk, and 
intending to go back again if the pounder had 
no special errand. The house adjoined the 


LEAVING HOME. 


9 


sidewalk, and drunken sailors sometimes would 
fancy the brown wall of the house was a drum- 
head and would give it a pound. 

“ Oh, that you. Bill ? You— you don’t want 
Joe? ” 

“ No, I don’t want him ” 

How that relieved Mother Waters, who, 
lying in bed and wiping her eyes, could hear 
every word ! 

“ But the cap’n wants him ! ” continued 
Bill. 

This brought back all of Mother Waters’ 
distress, and she came flying out of bed, and, 
rushing to the window, put out her night-cap 
alongside her husband’s tangled hair. 

'■ “You — you — you — don’t want Joey before 
breakfast ? ” asked Mother Waters trying to 
swallow her sobs. 

“ Well, I don’t want him anyway, but I 
think the cap'n wants him right away, and 
he’d better not wait for breakfast. The cap’n 
said half an hour ago he wanted me to go 
round and rouse the crew, for the wind had 
changed to sou’west, jest as he wanted it, and 
he might like to go in half an hour, he guessed ; 
and I ben a-rousin’ the crew, and as yours was 
a boy, thought I’d let him be till the last.” 

All the members of the Waters family were 


lO 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


now in the chamber, appearing there in vari- 
ous stages of dress or undress, all listening to 
Bill Stevens. 

“Whew!” exclaimed Joe, 'Mf Capn 
Grimes, half an hour ago, said he wanted to 
go in half an hour, how much time is there 
left? Guess I’d better be flying round.” 

“Shameful!” said Father Waters, who be- 
gan sorely to regret that he had ever sug- 
gested a whaling voyage to his big boy Joe. 
“ To hurry off this way a boy who is going to 
the North Pole ! It is scandalous ! I have a 
great mind to arrest Cap’n Bill Grimes.” 

As Father Waters was janitor of the town 
hall, he was also that awful being, ‘‘special 
police.” He had, without thought, used that 
phrase, “ North Pole,” and though a freezing 
term, it now melted to tears the mother, and 
she clapped her hands to her face, crying, 
“ Oh, dear ! ” 

This spectacle affected others. 

“ He shan’t — go ! ” whimpered Sammy. 
“ Who’s — going — to haul — me on — my sled, 
next winter? ” 

“ The w’ales — will — eat my dear, good 
Joey ! ” sobbed Kitty. 

“ It’s a burning shame ! ” avowed Angel. 
“I want to make Joe a cup of coffee; and 


LEAVING HOME. 


II 


I’ve got to boil the water — and where’s the 
time? Captain Bill Grimes may take his 
choice — to let me boil Joe a cup of coffee, or 
I — I — I’ll boil Captain Grimes ! ” 

This rather diverted the sorrow of the fam- 
ily, and changed tears to indignation and also 
laughter. 

The vane swung way round, when Father 
Waters exclaimed, “ There ! What am I 
doing? ” 

The nature of his attempt was now seen ; 
in his haste, he had run one leg down into a 
sleeve of his coat ! 

“ Let’s laugh ! ” suggested Angel, and the 
laugh did good, though it was too reckless to 
be entirely enjoyable. 

‘‘ There, folks, sorry, but I guess I must say 
good-bye, though.” 

This was Joe’s voice, and he came into the 
room, hat in hand. The tears of the family 
began to bubble again. 

“ Oh, don’t say good-bye now ! We will go 
down to the wharf,” cried out Mother Waters, 
“ and see you off.” 

Oh, will you ? That will be good. I’ll 
see you there. I suppose I had better start 
ahead. I want to be prompt, you know.” 

That is a good trait, my boy,” said his 


12 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


father, proudly. “ Follow up that idea, 
and ” 

Joe had here left, and his father stopped. 
He began again ; “ and be honest ” — he stopped 
again, for there was now a precipitate flight for 
the wharf. Mother Waters led off in the 
movement, her old sunbonnet bobbing up and 
down. Then came Father Waters, buttoning 
up his coat and scuffling along in shoes whose 
fastenings he had not secured. 

Angel lingered to prepare Sam and Kitty 
for their trip to the wharf, for Angel was the 
person on whom devolved such little and final 
duties. 


CHAPTER II. 

OFF ON THE WATER. 

<<T TO, Cap*n Bill !” said Joe’s father to a 
Jj^ good-natured, robust man, who was 
sauntering up and down the wharf to which 
the Ann Batten was tied, are you not hur- 
rying us a bit too much ? Bill said you wanted 
to go in half an hour.” 

Captain Bill laughed as he looked at the 
panting janitor and his wife. I said I would 
like to do it ; but I shall be lucky if I get off 
in an hour or two, even.” 

“ Oh ! ” replied Father Waters ; and his wife 
looked relieved, also saying “ Oh ! ” 

Father Waters wondered if there might not 
be a law to arrest and punish a man like Bill 
Stevens for getting people out of bed and house 
at an unnecessary hour. 

Very soon Angel came rushing along, tug- 
ging two children by the hand, and Captain 
Bill laughed again. 

** There, Captain Grimes,” said Angel, you 


14 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


must spare Joe long enough to have a cup of 
coffee.” 

Now, tush, tush!” cried the captain; 
“ that Bill Stevens has routed you all, and I 
will tell you what — you stop and have break- 
fast with me in the cabin. My wife is coming, 
too.” 

That plan was exceedingly popular. Smoke 
was already flying with energy from the funnel 
of the old black cook’s galley, and in twenty 
minutes, the Waters tribe all sat down with 
Captain Bill and his wife in the Ann Batten’s 
cabin. Such a snug, cozy cabin ! It was so 
small that when all were seated, Angel said to 
Joe in a suppressed voice, “ I am real hungry, 
and if this cabin was smaller, there wouldn’t 
be room for me and my breakfast too.” 

It was such a breakfast ! Everybody was as 
happy as people can be when some of them are 
going to the North Pole. 

Father Waters took Joe aside; My dear 
boy, one word more, do your duty toward God 
and man, and — and — be honest.” Honesty 
was one of the good man’s hobbies. 

— I — will,” said Joe a little huskily, and 
wiping his eyes. 

At last, about seven o’clock, all the crew 
having arrived, and wind and tide being favor* 


OFF ON THE WATER. 15 

able, the captain gave orders to cast off the last 
line holding the uneasy Ann Batten to the 
wharf, and the tide gently drifted this fretting 
female out into the river. 

“ Good-bye ! good-bye ! ” were the calls that 
went from ship to wharf and from wharf to 
ship again, the people on land flourishing hats 
and handkerchiefs, and those aboard promptly 
responding. The tears came in Joe’s eyes as 
he saw the rapidly-widening interval of river 
between the whaler and the Waters family. 
He was really off for the land of whales, the 
land of icebergs and of that mysterious tip of 
the axle of the earth — the North Pole. He 
saw his father holding up Sammy, and Angel 
lifting Kitty, and just over his father’s shoul- 
der he thought he could detect his mother’s 
old sun-bonnet. 

He did not have a lengthy chance to look, 
for the captain was giving his orders, and the 
men in response were tramping over the deck. 
One fluttering sail after another was loosened, 
topsails, jib, mainsail, other canvas-wings fol- 
lowing, till at last the Ann Batten out on the 
open ocean, from hull to mast-head was one 
column of white. Away she bounded over the 
billows, her prow pointed eastward. The long 
ocean-swell gently lifted her as on a crystal 


l6 A SALT WATER HERO. 

roller, and then as gently lowered her, but all 
the while the wind, putting its strong shoulders 
to the hull, and to every expanded strip of 
canvas, pushed the Ann Batten steadily for- 
ward. 

Joe knew personally most of the crew, and 
others he had heard about, as the ship was 
manned by sailors whose homes were in Joe’s 
town. He took a positive fancy to Henry 
Haven, a man about thirty-five years old. 
Henry had followed the sea ever since he was 
twenty years old, but still went before the 
mast, although a very intelligent seaman. 
That which tripped him on the way from the 
forecastle to the cabin was the rum-bottle — 
and how many people stumble over that! At 
sea, he could be trusted if he were denied all 
access to liquor. On shore, he was a sot. His 
experience on land was so discouraging that a 
sea-faring life had become a necessity. He 
was very social and generous, well read, and 
well able to express his thoughts. He enjoyed 
the society of this ‘‘ new boy ” on board the 
ship, wanting to know so much and finding 
very few who could enlighten him. 

One day when the ship was helped by a 
steady wind, and there was little work for the 
crew, Joe found Henry Haven in the vessel’s 


OFF ON THE WATER. 1 7 

bow, leaning over the rail and watching some 
object ahead. 

“ See that white thing ? ” asked Henry. 

“ Why, yes ; but not very distinctly.” 

“ We shall come up with it soon. That is 
an iceberg.” 

“An iceberg! ”cried Joe, excitedly. “Oh, 
where ? ” 

“ Over there to the nor’east,” said Henry, 
pointing in that direction. 

Joe could now make out a cluster of whit- 
ish objects under the northeast sky. 

“ I didn’t think we should meet those 
travellers from the Pole so soon.” 

“ Oh, yes, we are nearing the Newfoundland 
Banks, and the icebergs get caught on them as 
they go sailing along.” 

“ Banks ? I have heard of them.” 

“You ought to, by this time, if you have 
lived in Shipton.” 

“ A great place for fishing, I know, but I 
don’t see why.” 

“ Well, they tell me that a current comes 
down here from Labrador, and the Gulf Stream 
comes up from the south, you know, and these 
two currents deposit on these banks a lot of 
food for the little creatures that the cod and 
other fish feed upon. These last bring the 


1 8 A SALT WATER HERO. 

fishermen, who pull a lot of money out of the 
water. Famous place for fishermen. They 
come from the States, the British Provinces, 
and France even." 

“ The cod is the great fishery, isn’t it, down 
here in Newfoundland ? ’’ 

“ Yes, tremendous, along the shores, over at 
Labrador, and out here on the Banks.” 

‘‘ You have fished out on the Banks ? ” 

“ Oh, yes, and it is interesting to see how 
sort of systematic the coming of the cod is. 
You may reckon on seeing them about the 
first of June. And there is a little fellow that 
comes before them — what they call the caplin, 
a pretty little creature about half a foot long. 
They come in immense schools, and you may 
be sure the cod is not far away. Well, when 
the cod have lived on them about six weeks, 
the squid arrive. That is another fish the cod 
like, and they are used for bait. After the 
squid come the herring, and the cod like these. 
In October — say the middle or last part — the 
cod-fishing is over.” 

“ I should think the cod would give out.” 

“ Oh, no ; thick as ever ! Then they catch 
seals and salmon. Newfoundland is a great 
place for fishing, I tell you. But there are the 
icebergs ! ” 


OFF ON THE WATER. 


19 


A fleet of splendid masses of crystal came 
slowly sailing forward in great state, but the 
Ann Batten was careful not to encourage a 
near approach of these Arctic relics. 

It is growing colder,” exclaimed Joe. 

** Oh, yes, that is the way with icebergs ; 
they chill the air, of course. I have seen them 
over one hundred and fifty feet high, and they 
say icebergs will shoot up as high as two hun- 
dred and fifty. If what they say is true, and 
the part above water is only one-eighth of the 
entire length, you can see what a quantity is 
buried out of sight.” 

“ They come down from Greenland ? ” 

“Yes, kind of chips from the glaciers, you 
know — pieces broken off and set afloat.” 

For several hours the bergs went sailing by, 
rearing their pure crystal summits, with seams 
of blue or green, occasional masses falling into 
the sea, whipping it into a foam as white and 
pure as they. The bergs were square, then 
pyramidal, and again their crests were splin- 
tered into pinnacles that carried dazzling 
crowns of light. 

At times Joe and Henry would notice seals 
complacently stretched on cakes of ice, as if 
having mounted picturesque chariots of white, 
they were enjoying a very slow and sleepy ride. 


20 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Henry then told the young sailor about the 
sealhunting carried on by the Newfoundland- 
ers. The ship went on, carefully steering amid 
the great ice squadron. 

“ We won’t have much of the sea very long,” 
said Henry. “ There’s a fog coming.” 

A huge cloud of fog was advancing out of 
the east, dropping over the sea like the falling 
folds of a gray, woolly curtain. 

“ It will hide those icebergs,” said Joe. 

“Yes, and I had rather have them in sight. 
Awful critters to run into ! I think icebergs 
would account for the strange disappearance of 
some of the ships that never are heard from.” 

That was an ugly thought, and Joe felt 
that he would rather talk about Newfoundland; 

“ We shall see Newfoundland soon ? ” 

“ Before long ; rough shores, rocky, cut up 
by bays, you know. The people are increas- 
ing down here, though you might not think 
people would care much to live in Newfound- 
land. People will live though where they can 
make a living, and there is plenty of fishing to 
be done here. Some fine forests down this 
way, and a lot of game.” 

“I want to see St. John’s. Father said he 
would have a surprise for me.” 

“ Did he say that ? Surprises are in order 


OFF ON THE WATER. 


21 


on a whaling trip. We shall be in St. John’s 
before long.” 

Joe was exceedingly interested in the cap- 
ital of Newfoundland. Its appearance could 
have been classified under the head “ surprise.” 
Driving along a high, rocky, coast wall, the 
Ann Batten came to a break in this formid- 
able barrier. Entering this gap, passing be- 
tween Signal Hill and South Side Hill, the 
Ann Batten sailed through the Narrows and 
glided into the harbor beyond. Camped on 
the sloping land were the homes and ware- 
houses of a big, bustling town, at that time 
numbering over twenty thousand people, and 
now containing over thirty thousand. Joe 
wanted to go ashore. He forgot Henry 
Haven’s infirmity when he asked Henry if he 
would like to accompany him. 

“ I — I — feel like it Joe, , but — ” as he spoke, 
he grasped the rail of the whaler — “ but I don’t 
dare to. I’ll hold on here. Best way to man- 
age temptation is to keep away from it.” 

“ That’s right, Henry,” said Captain Grimes, 
who came up just then. “ Stick by the ship.” 

‘‘ I mean to. Joe won’t need me. He will 
find his way about and come home straight, 
and I will have a welcome ready for him. He’s 
all right. Shouldn’t wonder if he had a temper- 


22 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


ance pledge in his pocket now, stuck there by 
his folks.” 

“ He’s got it in his heart, and that’s bet- 
ter still,” remarked Capt. Grimes. 

“ Nothing like having a cap’n who can talk 
like a minister,” said Henry. 

Several of the crew wished to “ cruise round ” 
St. John’s, and Joe had an abundance of com- 
pany. They visited the winding streets, the 
oil factories and the stores, curiously watched 
an ocean steamer halting on her trip to 
Europe, and stared at the big fishing-fleet con- 
tinually receiving accessions from the frothing, 
tumbling sea, and continually sending out again 
the hardy, plucky fishermen. 

“Glad to see you back,” shouted Henry 
Haven from the vessel as Joe neared the 
Ann Batten on his return. “Got something 
for you in the for’c’stle. Got some letters 
from home, and ” 

Joe did not halt to hear anything more, 
but sprang upon deck and quickly followed 
Henry into the forecastle. There in the corner 
was suspended a blanket taken from one of the 
berths. 

“ There, Joe, I’ve something on exhibition 
behind that blanket — something rare, some- 
thing wonderful ” 


OFF ON THE WATER. 


23 


Is it fish, flesh or fowl ? ” 

Here Joe caught the sound of suppressed 
laughter behind the blanket. 

“The animals on exhibition will please be 
quiet,” sang out Henry, a request made in 
good English, a language which the “ animals ” 
seemed to understand perfectly, for there was 
instant silence behind the blanket. 

“What have you got there, Henry?” asked 
Joe. “ Tell a feller ! ” 

“ Do you remember you said your father 
said he would have a surprise for you at St. 
John’s?” 

“ Oh, yes!” 

“ Well, young man, whom would you like to 
see behind that blanket if you could have any 
choice ? ” 

“ If I could have my choice among animals, 
I would like to see the old cat from my home, 
before the biggest, finest beast you could scare 


up. 


“ Oh well, take ^ animals ’ as meaning some- 
thing more than the four-legged critters ; say 
men, or ” 

“ Not women, down here ? Because if I 
could see them, I would like to see Angel, my 
sister, sooner than anybody else ! ” 

“ I can show you somebody that comes 


24 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


pretty near Angel ! ” said Henry, pulling aside 
the blanket, and there was — 

“Nat Perry!” shouted Joe, rushing for- 
ward. “ Nat Perry ! how glad I am to see 
you ! Hurrah ! Glad to get you, old boy! ” 

“ So am I, on my side. Your father did 
that pretty well.” 

“I guess so! He couldn’t have done bet- 
ter ! ” 

“ Except Angel,” suggested Henry. 

“ Well, for this trip, I wouldn’t swap Nat for 
Angel. Oh, I am glad to see you ! But how 
did you get here? ” said Joe. 

“ All owing to your father. He wrote to me, 
sending by a fishing schooner from home, tell- 
ing me he had fixed it with Cap’n Grimes, so 
that I could have a chance to ship on board the 
Ann Batten at St. John’s, if our skipper at 
the Banks could let me off there and I could 
get here ; and — I did ! ” 

‘ ‘ Father didn’t make a mistake, now did he ? ” 
“ Not he ! Takes your father to plan ! ” said 
Henry. 

Yes, the janitor was remarkable for his plans 
rather than for their execution. 


CHAPTER III. 

AMONG THE ICEBERGS. 

APT. GRIMES wished to make his whaling 



apparatus more complete, and having 


purchased at St. John’s the lances and har- 
poons he needed, the bow of the Ann Batten 
was headed again for the open sea, and, pass- 
ing between the noble headlands at the mouth 
of the harbor, boldly plunged into the waves 
with crests foam-feathered by the strong 
North Atlantic winds. It was the last day of 
April when the Ann Batten began the sec- 
ond stage of her journey to the whaling 
grounds of Greenland. It was the evening of 
that day that the ship raced by the bright torch 
of the light-house at Bonavista. The next day, 
a fleet of icebergs sailed by the ship, and then 
came a furious wind. How it roared ! 

‘‘ I thought the wind could make a racket 
at home, blowing down our lane, Nat,” said 
Joe, “ but this beats it ! ” 

He said this while lying in his berth in the 


26 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


forecastle. The ship was so uneasy that a re- 
clining position was far more comfortable than 
a seat on his chest. 

“ Yes,” said Nat, answering from his berth 
just below Joe’s, but we shall catch it worse 
than this.” 

What a tumult ! The long waves seemed to 
be heavy scourges with which the wind smote 
again and again the vessel’s sides, dealing 
blows that made every timber quiver. There 
was this repeated smiting, crashing, below ; and 
above — what a babel ! Was there any chance 
crack or aperture anywhere that the wind could 
reach ? How the wind moaned, cried, or 
whistled through it ! Every rope became a 
wire in an immense wind-harp that the storm 
breathed upon, filling the air with its loud, 
mournful music. Was there a spar that could 
be induced to creak? The wind lost not its 
opportunity, but forced out as harsh, rasping, 
and disagreeable a sound as possible. Very 
little canvas was spread, for very little was 
needed. The vessel drove along as if the 
frightened prey at which countless wolves down 
in the sea were directing their white, frothing 
jaws. 

“What’s this?” asked Joe, the next day, 
in calmer weather overhauling the contents of 


AMONG THE ICEBERGS. 2y 

his chest, which had been shaken up in the 
late commotion. It was a book that had been 
brought to the surface by the late agitation of 
the sea. On the front fly-leaf were written 
these words: From Angel.” 

It was a Bible that Joe’s sister had given 
him. 

“ I ought to read that,” he said. “ How 
would it do to begin the Psalms ? ” 

The storm that had so shaken the vessel and 
all its load, had agitated Joe’s conscience. He 
was never in such a hard blow before. He 
never had had such a sense of human insecurity 
as when the big waves were tossing the Ann 
Batten up and down like a little chip. It 
gave an unusual seriousness to Joe’s thoughts. 
Later events added new interest to the subject^ 
The Ann Batten was now in Davis’ Strait, 
named after John Davis, of England, who, in 
the year 1585, saw Greenland; and what an 
unattractive object it was, thus sighted July 
20th ! He made this word-picture of it — land 
that was very high and full of mightie moun- 
tains all covered with snowe ; no viewe of 
wood, grasse or earth to be seene, and the shore 
two leagues off into the sea full of yce. The 
lothsome view of the shore and irksome noyse 
of the yce was such that it bred strange con- 


28 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


ceites among us.” Farther ahead, he painted 
Greenland in more attractive colors, saying 
that he found “ many greene and pleasant isles 
bordering upon the shore.” 

The Ann Batten had not reached those 
“greene and pleasant isles,” but was bothered 
by a thick, dreary fog. 

“I don’t like this, Joe,” said Nat. “You 
see there is a lot of ice drifting in about us.” 

“ I have been watching it. Danger of run- 
ning into it ? ” 

“Yes; might run into a big floe, and the 
ice wedge about us ; or if we should hit an ice- 
berg, you see, it might be a serious blow.” 

Capt. Grimes here came up to the two sail- 
ors. 

“ Nat, you relieve the lookout there in the 
bows,” said the captain.- “You keep him 
company, Joe. Keep a sharp lookout, boys ! ” 

“ Aye, aye, sir ! ” they sang out together. 

Forward into the bows of the vessel moved 
the two young sailors and sharply strained 
their sight. The ship, spreading very little 
canvas, was moving slowly through this great 
dismal cloud of gray fog, so thick in every 
direction. The sea was strewn with cakes of 
ice, amid which protruded occasional small 
bergs. 


AMONG THE ICEBERGS. 29 

Look out sharp for anything big and whit- 
ish, Joe.” 

I will, Nat.” 

The young men liked to be together, for 
while they had certain traits in common, bind- 
ing them together by mere force of sympathy, 
they were unlike in other things, and that 
very unlikeness drew Nat to Joe and Joe to 
Nat. Joe was very impulsive, very quick in 
his decisions, sometimes hasty and rash. Nat 
was slower in his resolutions, and they were 
made more thoughtfully. Consequently, Joe 
might be obliged to take down the struct- 
ure he had builded, while Nat’s was more 
likely to be permanent. On the other hand, 
Nat might not act with sufficient rapidity. 
While hesitating, that he might be sure he was 
doing the wise thing, he might let his oppor- 
tunity slip by him. 

If the two characters could have been 
mixed, Nat’s deliberateness leavening Joe’s 
impetuosity, and Joe’s quick impulses start- 
ing up the deliberating Nat, the combination 
would have been an excellent one. We can- 
not, though, mix the contents of two such 
vessels as two human souls. We must be our- 
selves and try — to improve. 

Joe Waters and Nat Perry now stood side 


30 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


by side in the bows of the vessel, peering 
through the fog, trying to make out whether 
an open, friendly sea might be ahead, or block- 
ing and hostile ice. Henry Haven was steer- 
ing. Capt. Grimes was amid-ships, leaning 
over the vessel’s rail and trying with his vision 
to reach the other side of the fog to the lee- 
ward. 

“ What’s that, Joe ? ” said Nat. 

‘‘Where, Nat?” asked Joe, whose eyes 
were not so well trained for marine observation 
as those of Nat. 

“Just ahead, Joe ! ” 

“ Oh, yes, I see ! ” 

It was a big, whitish mass projecting itself 
through the gray fog, an immense object that 
seemed to have suddenly towered up out of 
the sea rather than drifted down from the 
unknown tracts ahead. 

“Oh, hard! hard!” yelled Joe, turning 
round in frantic haste. Nat swung about also 
and with his big voice shouted more delib- 
erately but as imperatively, and gave the whole 
of the needed warning, “ Hard a-port ! ” 

Capt. Grimes energetically caught up the 
danger-cry and shrieked, “ Hard a-port ! ” 

“Aye, aye, sir!” responded the watchful 
Henry, and he threw the helm over on the 


AMONG THE ICEBERGS. 


31 


port or left side. This threw the ship’s head 
round in the opposite direction, the right or 
starboard. The Ann Batten was prompt to 
feel and mind her rudder — her blocks rat- 
tling, her canvas flapping — and she swung 
aside none too soon. A ponderous, lofty ice- 
berg, white and chilly, came out of the fog 
and looked down on the Ann Batten with 
such a freezing, pitiless pride ! 

“ Hard, hard there ! ” screamed Capt. Grimes 
in his sharp, high tones. 

“Aye, aye, sir!” sang out Henry, pressing 
his helm still more energetically. It seemed 
at one point as if the Ann Batten could 
not escape hopeless collision with this white 
ice-monster. She did hit it where a corner 
projected, her lee yard-arms scraping along 
the ice and knocking off pieces of the purest, 
whitest crystal, which rattled down upon the 
deck. There was one moment of extreme 
suspense on board the Ann Batten. Joe 
thought it might be his last moment, but the 
next the Ann Batten glided by the berg, 
and everybody breathed more easily. Joe 
was so absorbed in watching this interruption 
that he impulsively gave all his thoughts to it 
and forgot he was a “ lookout.” The captain’s 
warning, “Keep a sharp lookout there ! ” brought 
him back to the side of the cooler and more 


32 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


experienced Nat, who had been a sailor long 
enough to know that a “ lookout ” must not 
forget, amid the most intense excitement, that 
he is still a “ lookout.” 

“ Wasn’t that a narrow escape ! ” exclaimed 
Joe. 

“ That was, indeed. It sends the blood back 
where it came from, and chills you just 
through.” 

“Ugh I” said Joe, with a shudder, trying to 
look composedly into the fog that threw its 
gray folds low down upon the drifting ice and 
the cold, dark spaces of sea- water. It was a te- 
dious, anxious and protracted passage amid the 
ice and through the fog, that the Ann Batten 
was now making ; but fog cannot last always, 
and it finally lifted. The awful bergs were 
there, but it was some relief to see them. The 
Ann Batten pressed northward. 

“ We ought to see whales,” said Capt. Grimes, 
one day, “and I hope the lookout will spy 
something worth going for.” 

Henry Haven, who had twice visited the 
whaling grounds of the Arctic Ocean, was sta- 
tioned as lookout and keenly inspected the 
cold, blue, ice-tufted sea. One day, as Joe 
was at work on the deck, coiling rope, he sud- 
denly heard Henry’s voice singing out, “ There 
she blows ! ” 


AMONG THE ICEBERGS. 3^ 

It came again, that sharp, exciting cry, 
“ There she blows ! ” 

The quiet deck of the whaler was the scene 
of instant and great excitement. Mate Jim 
Brown, who was inspecting a water-cask, looked 
up and shouted, “ Where away is that whale ? ” 

“ On the lee beam, two miles off, sir ! 
Look out sharp for her ! ” 

Joe dropped his rope. Henry Haven, who 
was mopping the deck, let fall his mop. The 
old colored cook, Pomp Curtis, ran his head 
out of his warm caboose. Capt. Grimes came 
tumbling out of the cabin, for he had caught 
the echoes of the welcome cry, and shouted to 
the mate, “ Sing out when the ship heads 
for that whale ! ” 

“ Aye, aye, sir ! ” 

“ Keep her away, away there ! ” said Capt. 
Grimes. “ Joe, hand me the spy-glass!” 

Joe ran down into the cabin, brought the 
spy-glass, and the captain raised it to his eyes. 

“ Steady ! ” shouted Henry. 

Steady it is ! ” responded Bill Mason, the 
man at the helm, and in tones so deep that his 
voice seemed to have no bottom. 

Capt. Grimes now turned to go aloft. He 
looked back a moment, saying to the mate, 
“ Mr. Brown, you may square the after-yards 
and then call all hands.” 


CHAPTER IV. 
whales! whales! 

<< ATOW, lively there!” roared the mate. 

“ Lively there and square the after 
yards ! Nat, call all hands ! ” 

“ Aye, aye, sir. All hands, ahoy ! ” sang out 
Nat. 

It was hardly necessary to give this order to 
the forecastle. The crew had caught the glad 
sound, and they had been rushing on deck, till 
few were left behind. 

Many of them had beenon whaling voyages, 
and these deep-sea hunters welcomed the excite- 
ment of a chase after whales. 

“ Stand by the boats ! ” came the order. 
“ Boat-steerers, get your boats ready ! ” 

In the meantime, Henry had spied still more 
game, and shouted, “ There she blows ! ” 

This time, the game was nearer the ship. 
With quickened interest, the boats were made 
ready. The tubs were deposited in them. On 
to the harpoons the lines were bent. The 


whales! whales! 


35 


crews for three boats stood patiently yet ex- 
citedly near them, and only waited the captain’s 
command to lower away. 

“ There she blows ! ” called out Henry again. 

Not half a mile off ! ” 

This quickened the interest of the crew in- 
tensely. One could see the men’s eyes flashing, 
while their hands worked nervously. Henry’s 
cry meant a third whale. 

‘‘Three whales to three boats!” said Joe 
to Nat. “ Oh, good ! Let’s go together ! ” 

“ I hope so, Joe.” 

The captain now divided the men into three 
crews for the three boats, and Nat and Joe 
were assigned to the boat that the mate, Jim 
Brown, commanded. 

“Down helm!” called out Capt. Grimes. 
“ Mr. Brown, brace up the mizzen-top-sail ! 
Hoist and swing the boats ! Lower away ! ” 

With a lively rattle, down went the boats, 
each dropping into the sea like an egg into its 
nest. They were all speedily manned, and 
started off. The different whales would disap- 
pear and then come up, the water shooting up 
and falling back into the sea again, wherever a 
whale was breathing. 

Away went the mate’s boat, in which were 
Joe and Nat, heading for the whale that had 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


36 

been assigned to them. How splendidly the 
men pulled ! It was click, click,” as the oars 
turned in the row-locks, the sound coming 
with all the regularity of pendulum-ticks. As 
if machinery, the men bent to their oars 
together, and then together came the long, 
hard pull. 

“If this isn’t splendid!” said Joe to Nat. 
“ Best fun I ever had I ” 

“ Fun isn’t yet, Joe ! ” 

“Isn’t it?” 

The mate was saying, “ There’s the whale ! ” 
Joe could see the whale’s broad, dusky 
back, as the. fish lay quietly on the surface of 
the sea, lazily blowing, little suspecting that 
any captors were so anxious to see it as to 
have come all the way from the United States 
that they might enjoy the sight, and then the 
capture. 

“ Now, men,” the mate was saying, just lay 
back hard ! Hard, hard ! Give it to her ! 
Put in the muscle ! A little harder ! We will 
have the first fish. Oh, harder ! Go it ! 
There, there ! Once more ! ” 

How that boat drove through the water, as 
if Neptune had lent his fastest horses for the 
occasion ! 

Stand up I ” coolly said the mate. 


whales! whales! 


37 


Bill Mason was the harpooner in that boat 
and rose to his feet at once. He was all ready, 
and he sent two sharp harpoons into his prey. 
The two were attached to one tow-line. As 
the whale felt their sharp thrust, off it started ! 

Joe never forgot the time when he went 
after his first whale and felt the excitement of 
a ride in a team where a maddened whale 
furnished the motive power. The line had run 
out of the boat with such rapidity as the 
whale sped away that the friction made the 
rail smoke, and water was thrown upon it to 
prevent fire. 

“ Give it line! ” shouted the mate. 

“ The line is paid out ! ” was the response. 

** Then — go it ! said the mate. 

The boat dragged by the whale was “ going 
it,” but it was not a long trip. The whale was 
exhausted by these efforts to free itself from 
the sharp harpoon, and when it appeared 
again, the mate sent a keen lance into the 
fish, shouting, “ Stern all ! ” 

A second lance was fatally shot. The whale 
threshed the water in its convulsions and then 
sped round in a circle. This so-called “ flurry ” 
was soon over. The creature turned upon its 
left side and floated, as destitute of life as a 
piece of driftwood thrown upon a beach by an 
autumn storm. 


38 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


“ Hurrah ! ” cried Nat. 

Give ’em reg’lar ! Three cheers — hurrah ! ” 
cried the mate. 

The men rose in the boat, and their vigor- 
ous huzzahs rang over the cold, sparkling sea. 
The sun was shining at the time, touching into 
a white flame every piece of drifting ice ; and 
amid this crystalline splendor, displayed as if 
purposely to grace a triumph, the whalers, tak- 
ing their prey in tow, rowed exultantly to the 
ship. One of the other boats had been success- 
ful, so that two dead whales were soon moored 
securely to the Ann Batten. 

“ It will be a busy day to-morrow, Joe,” 
said Henry Haven. 

The next day was all that Henry Haven 
prophesied. First, the whales were stripped 
of their blubber. Henry and others, strapping 
iron spikes or “ spurs ” to their boots to pre- 
vent slipping, went out upon the big-bodied 
fish, and with blubber spades and knives sepa- 
rated the blubber from the carcasses. It came 
off in long strips, which were hoisted aboard 
the vessel. These have the name of “ blanket- 
pieces.” Some of them have a weight of one 
or two tons. They were lowered into the 

blubber-room,” which was located under the 
main hatch between decks. Bill Mason was on 


whales! whales! 


39 


duty here. He would cut the blanket-pieces ” 
into “ horse-pieces ” about a foot square. The 
blubber going down as “ blanket ’’ therefore 
came up as “ horse,” and a pike or fork would 
land it on the deck. What was “ horse ” must 
then be “ minced.” 

Joe and Nat were assigned to this duty. 
They were stationed at a small table fastened 
to the vessel’s rail, and this table was called a 
“ mincing-horse.” 

Here Joe was furnished with a short-handled 
hook. Gripping the piece so that it could not 
slip, he waited patiently until Nat, the “ min- 
cer,” could operate upon it. He worked a knife 
that had two handles. He cut each “ horse ” 
into thin slices, not quite dividing them, the 
whole making “ a book.” What was “ whale,” 
then “blanket,” then “horse,” and finally 
“ book,” was next thrown into a big tub, and 
boiling began any time that a lively fire was 
under way in the brick arches that supported 
two or three pots. “ Book ” after “ book ” was 
fed out to the intellectual hunger of these iron 
pots, and then the oil was dipped out into a 
copper cooler. The oil took another journey to 
the oil casks, and those were stowed down in 
the hold. 

Let me not forget the precious whalebone. 


40 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


This is connected with the skull or crown-bone, 
and it is in the form of slabs which in a big 
whale are six to eight feet long. These are 
set about half an inch apart, and the inner edge 
of each slab is lined with a fringe of hair. We 
will suppose that the whale wishes to take 
its dinner. It has been on a long tramp, trying, 
maybe, to hunt up its wandering relatives, 
and it is very hungry. Its dinner, you say, 
will be a big fat walrus. Not that, but do you 
see that little shrimp in the water? Measure 
it. Just half an inch long! That little thing 
is the big whale’s food. But not just one for 
dinner? We will see. These shrimps are of 
a blood-red color. They travel in vast shoals, 
and give the water a blood-red tinge for miles 
sometimes, as they float on the surface of the 
sea. Our hungry whale has been hunting 
round for a restaurant. It sees one with an 
immense red door just ahead. An unpracticed 
traveller might think it was a Chinese laundry, 
but the whale knows better. The impression 
made on its brain is this : “ That is a field of 
shrimps ! There is my dinner ! Let me go for 
them ! ” Does the whale knock those little 
half-inch creatures on the head? No, the 
whale gets them into its head. The mode of 
capture is very simple but very effective. The 


whales! whales! 


41 


whale just opens its mouth and drives through 
that field of shrimps as if mad ! When its 
dining-room is about as full as it will hold, 
then, with lips open, the whale forces out the 
water between the hair-fringed slabs. These 
act as a kind of sieve, letting out the water, 
but the whale’s dinner is retained. This is 
gathered up by an enormous tongue and dis- 
patched at once. 

The tongue is a great lump of fat that 
may have in it “ four or five barrels,” as the 
crew of a whaler would say. How many mouth- 
fuls a whale needs to satisfy its appetite, I can- 
not say, but a hungry boy can guess. To go 
back ; those long slabs in the whale’s mouth, 
so helpful at dinner-time, furnish the whale- 
bone that for many purposes has been found 
so valuable by reason of its elasticity and dur- 
ability. 

Another feature of whaling Joe was inter- 
ested in, called “ bailing the case.” This is a 
portion of the head. It is a treasure-house of 
oil. This is carefuly removed when the case 
has been raised out of the water far enough to 
prevent all interference of the sea with the 
bailing. Now-a-days, we hear about “ oil- 
wells.” This one in the whale’s head is of 
strange fashioning. 


CHAPTER V. 


A BEAR HUNT. 

<< T TAKE a great fancy to Pompey’^ ca- 
X boose,” was Joe’s assertion one day, 
to Nat Perry. 

“ I don’t wonder at it, Joe, up here. It 
wouldn’t be so attractive down at the equator.” 

The cook’s quarters on a cold day, when 
across the Arctic sea a bleak wind was driving 
or a snow storm whirling, gave a welcome 
shelter. Against one wall of the caboose stood 
the stove, or range, and it was a mammoth one 
adapted to the kitchen department of vessels 
off on long, hard sea-voyages. At one side of 
the stove was a sink, generally piled high with 
dishes that needed washing. On the other side 
was a table where Pompey made his bread or 
the puddings for which he was famous. Above 
table and sink, every foot of space was covered 
with shelves and racks, where dishes of every 
kind could be securely packed away. 

‘‘ If I had a good anchor,” Pompey had said 


A BEAR HUNT. 


43 


to his captain, ** and could anchor all dose 
tings, it would be handy in a gale — dey slip 
roun* so easy.” 

Opposite the stove was a bench where the 
cook could sit. And his berth must not be 
forgotten, for Pomp Curtis did his work, took 
his meals and his rest all in one place. His 
berth was in the rear of the bench. 

Eberyting handy ! ” he would sometimes 

say. 

The old cook was between fifty and sixty, 
very notional, very sensitive, as proud of his 
caboose as a captain of his cabin. 

While he had his peculiarities, Pomp was also 
a very warm-hearted old fellow and an excellent 
cook. If anybody scolded him, such ill-humor 
was likely to last only until the sailors had their 
messes,” and then Pomp’s coffee or biscuit 
oi soup or pudding would make him as popular 
as Napoleon among his soldiers. 

For some reason Pomp took a fancy to 
Joe and would often invite him to sit down 
on the bench in the cook’s little house. 

^‘Warm in here!” exclaimed Joe one 
afternoon, when a sharp wind was biting the 
cheeks and nose of every exposed sailor, and 
he thrust his head into the warm, dusky at- 
mosphere of the caboose. 


44 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


‘‘Come in, chile!” exclaimed the cook, 
unexpectedly starting up out of a mass of 
shadow opposite the stove. 

“Thank you!” said Joe, carefully closing 
the door after him and sitting down by the side 
of Pompey on the bench that was the cook’s 
throne. Joe looked at the warm fire-light 
breaking out of the front of the stove, felt the 
grateful heat playing over his face, and said, 
“ Seems just like our kitchen at home.” 

“ Does it, honey ? ” 

“ Just like it.” 

And also everybody in it ? 

It is true, Pomp did not look like Angel, who 
in her mother’s feebleness was the special guar- 
dian of the kitchen at home, but the stove, the 
table on which were Pomp’s bread-pans, and 
the rows of dishes, looked very domestic. 

“You got a home? I’se got one. I’d like 
to see my ole ’ooman an’ my Wash’n’t’n,” said 
the cook plaintively. 

“ You got a boy? ” 

“ Oh, yas ! I fought sure he’d meet me an’ 
jinemeat St. John’s. An’ I kent ’splain it,” 
said the cook with a puzzled look, resting his 
chin on his hand, “ but I tink — I tink — he miss 
us an’ got aboar’ anudder w’aler,” 

“ Too bad ! tOQ b^d ! 


A BEAR HUNT. 


45 


** Jes* so. You look jes’ like my Wash’n’t’n ! 
Walk like him ! An’ speak like him ! Jes* like 
him ! ’* 

Here, as Joe looked up in surprise, the 
cook fondly laid his hand on Joe’s knee, as if 
he were in that act claiming and adopting him. 
When the latter felt that emphatic hand and 
saw the whites of the cook’s staring eyes as 
they were directed toward him, there was some- 
thing so ridiculous in the thought that he re- 
sembled the beloved Washington, whose face 
might be as black as the under-side of Pomp’s 
tea-kettle, that Joe wanted to break out into 
boisterous laughter. That was like impulsive 
Joe Waters. But he took that wise second- 
thought which prevents many foolish things, 
and only said, “ You think so, do you? ’* 

I — I’se — know so,” asserted Pomp very pos- 
itively, shaking his head. ** I’se — know — so. 
See it de fus’ time I sot my eyes on ye. Walk 
like Wash’n’t’n ! Talk like Wash’n’t’n ! Look 
like Wash’n’t’n ! Can’t deceeb dis yer ole nig- 
ger ! ” 

At Pomp’s words, Joe took out his hand- 
kerchief and wiped his nose; and, thus 
screened, he could smile without giving offense. 

“ An’ 1 got a fabur to ax ye.” 

What is it ? I’ll do it if I can.” 


46 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


“Oh, ye can, I know! Yer know a heap. 
Wash’n’t’n used ter.” 

“ What is it?” 

“ My boy used ter read to me Sunday arter- 
noons out ob my Bible.” 

Pomp reached up to a shelf over his head 
and took down a leather-covered book with 
brown edges. 

“ I want yer to read to me ebery Sunday 
arternoon.” 

“ I will, certainly.” 

Joe kept his word. The next Sunday after- 
noon he came to the caboose and asked what 
he should read. 

“ When Tm on de sea, arter w’ales, yer know, 
I like to hear ’bout dat Jonah, den ’bout dose 
folks what’s gwine down to de great deep — 
what’s gwine down in ships. Dat’s a psalm, 
yer know.” 

Joe read patiently about Jonah, and then 
from that psalm— the one hundred and seventh 
— which remembers the tossed, perplexed sailor 
and cradles him snugly, peacefully in its verses. 

“De bery voice! Jes’ de same as Wash- 
’n’t’n ! Gib a heap ef I knew whar dat chile 
war ! ” said Pomp, rising and looking out of the 
little caboose window upon the great Arctic 
sea, as if he thought the long-desired Washing- 


A BEAR HUNT. 47 

ton might be navigating one of the ice-cakes 
afloat there. 

Don see nuffin ! ” moaned Pomp. “ Not 
eben a bar’ or a seal ! ” 

“Bear? Polar bear?” asked Joe. “I 
would like to see one of those critters.” 

“ Yer will ’fore yergit froo.” 

It was that very week that Joe’s wish was 
gratified. The Ann Batten was steadily 
pushing up Davis’ Straits, here and there har- 
pooning a whale, but one day there was no cry, 
“ There she blows ! ” Instead, Joe was grat- 
ified to hear this remark by Capt. Grimes who 
was looking off through his spy-glass : “ I don’t 
know — but — what — I see a — bear.” 

He spoke hesitatingly, like one who was 
making up his mind upon a certain subject. 

** You do ? Oh, what is it like ? ” 

Capt. Grimes now lowered his glass. 

“ May be mistaken, Joe. What does a 
polar bear look like ? Well, I’ll tell you. It 
has smooth, white fur, a flattish head, and — for a 
bear — a pretty long neck. You never find it 
far from the sea.” 

“I would like to see one. Let me look 
through your glass, Cap’n ? ” 

“ Oh, yes ! See what you can find.” 

“ I — I — really think something — something’s 


48 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


moving on the ice — and — now it’s tumbling 
— into the water — and now it is — out — again — 
on the ice.” 

“ May be a seal ! ” 

“Would you have any objections to our 
taking a boat — Henry, Nat and I — and going 
off there? We might take a gun.” 

“You can go. Sort of calm now, and the 
vessel is on a tack that will bring her about 
where you are going. There is another vessel, 
I see, over that way — one of those old-country, 
English whalers, I guess.” 

“ Well, she hasn’t any boat out after any- 
thing, has she ? ” asked Joe, eagerly. 

“You afraid she will get a prize away from 
you ? ” 

“ Not if we can help it, Cap’n. We will be 
off soon.” 

A boat putting off speedily from the Ann 
Batten contained Henry Haven, Nat Perry, 
Joe Waters — and a gun. 

“Joe, you steer, and Nat and I will put in 
the licks with our oars,” said Henry. 

“Aye, aye!” responded Joe. “Now give 
it to her, old man. I really believe we have 
got some kind of a prize there ! If that English 
vessel don’t send a boat ! Put in, now ! ” 

The ice that Joe thought might yield a 


A BEAR HUNT. 


49 


prize was a large floe, and there certainly was 
some object stirring on its surface. Joe did 
hope it was a bear, but, seen against the ice, 
the game could not be so distinctly made out. 
That led Joe to conclude it might be a 
white bear. It moved again. Joe could see 
dark blue water beyond a corner of the floe. 

“ If it only comes between us and that 
water,” thought Joe, “we can make it out.” 

“ Boys,” he said in a moment, “ I really be- 
gin to believe it is a bear.” 

Henry had been looking round several times, 
and now said as he smiled, “ I don’t want to 
frighten you, Joe, but I made up my mind 
some time ago that it was a bear.” 

“ Frighten !” cried Joe, jumping up in the 
boat. “ Oh jolly, if it is a bear ! ” 

“Steady there!” advised Nat. “If you 
should upset this boat and be spilled over- 
board, that bear might get at you and make 
short work of you.” 

“Come on!” shouted Joe, defiantly. “I 
am good for all the bears in the world.” 

There was soon no doubt at all about the 
nature of the encounter that was awaiting the 
valorous party from the Ann Batten. Crawl- 
ing leisurely around a hummock projecting 
from the field of ice, a white bear could be 


50 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


seen. He did not seem to see those in the 
boat, and Joe, in a half-smothered voice, called 
out to his companions, Put in there ! He is 
ours ! Go it ! Quick ! ” 

In a few moments, the boat touched the ice, 
Joe steering her to a point beyond the bear, 
intending to march upon him from the rear. 
The bear was now aware of the approach of 
danger, and he waddled away toward the oppo- 
site side of the floe. 

“ Isn’t he fat ! ” cried Joe. ‘‘ Put in ! ” 

The moment the boat touched the floe, Joe 
did not stop to help secure the boat and did 
not take the gun with him, but in his impul- 
sive way started off to chase the bear. 

Hir-r-rup there ! ” shouted Joe. 

Away went the bear, and away went Joe as 
if he were pursuing an old sheep. 

“ Come back here ! ” shouted Nat. Quick, 
Henry ! I’ll take the gun. Let’s follow that 
boy up ! ” 

‘*Y-e-s!” said Henry, hurriedly. “Let me 
roll this cake of ice on this painter, or we shall 
lose the boat. Come back, Joe! Hold on!” 

“Stop, Joe!” bawled Nat, hurrying after 
Joe, who had foolishly pitched a sharp piece 
of ice at the bear that was near the other side 
of the floe. 


A BEAR HUNT. 


51 


Good ! IVe hit him ! ” yelled Joe. 
“Come on, fellers! IVe hit him! He is 
mine ! ” 

What if the bear had a like intention con- 
cerning Joe? 

Would it be “mine,’' or “thine?” The 
bear had turned about. He was now coming 
toward Joe ! 

This famous bear-hunter suddenly found 
himself in a very perplexing situation. He 
was no longer behind a stupid mass of whitish 
fur clumsily running, but that mass had 
turned toward him ! It had become B-E-A-R 
in full — an ugly-looking one, with big, fright- 
ful paws, with cunning, greedy, cruel eyes. 
Joe took one hasty look, realized his position, 
turned and ran ! He could see between him 
and the edge of the blue water a large hum- 
mock. 

“I’ll make for that,” thought Joe, “and 
climb it. Oh dear ! ” 

He reached the hummock and tried to turn 
its southern corner, but the bear was after him. 

“ Oh, dear ! ” groaned Joe. How distinctly 
he could hear the bear’s steps ! 

Nearer, nearer, nearer ! 

Where were Henry and Nat? They were 
coming, but before they could reach Joe 


52 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


while he was saying to himself, “ Oh, dear ! 
he has got me, sure ! ” a rifle-report echoed in 
the air, and then Joe heard the sound of a 
heavy tumble on the ice, and the growling of 
an infuriated animal close at his heels. But 
that was a strange quarter in which Joe heard 
the crack of the rifle. He ventured, while 
rounding the corner of a hummock, to turn his 
head. It was an unlucky turn. He slipped, 
missed his footing and fell, just as he had 
caught sight of his adversary who was rising 
up and rushing at him as if Joe were the cause 
of all his agony. 

‘‘Oh, dear! he has got me now! thought 
Joe. “ Help-p-p ! ” he yelled. 

“All right, Joe!” said a deliberate voice 
close at hand, and in the direction of the 
Ann Batten’s boat. 

Bang-g-g ! went a second gun. 

“ All right, Joe ! ” said Nat Perry again. 

Joe now heard the sound of a heavier 
tumble. He rose upon his knees, looked 
back, and within six feet of him the bear had 
stretched out and was breathing his last. 

But who was the second hunter that Joe 
saw ? It was a young colored man, whose 
face seemed exceedingly black in contrast with 
the ice that stretched in its glassy whiteness 


A BEAR HUNT. 


53 


all about him. He carried a gun, and had 
given the bear the first shot he received. Be- 
hind him came two others, each poising a gun 
over the shoulder. Nat and the colored gun- 
ner were standing on opposite sides of the 
bear. Henry and Joe, also the two other 
gunners, came up and joined the bear and his 
visitors. 

“Well! well!” said Joe, still rubbing his 
arms and legs, that had been bruised by the 
fall. “ I — I am much obliged to you. Here 
is enough meat for one dinner! ” 

“ He mos’ made a dinner ob you ! ” said the 
young colored hunter, grinning. “ I ralley 
s’pose, though, we were to blame for his goin’ 
arter you. We came in a boat from dat Eng- 
lish whaler, saw dis yer bear, an’ didn’ see you 
until we landed. De bear spied us, an’ jes’ 
turned roun’ and put fur ye.” 

“ I thought,” observed Joe, “that the old 
feller was paying altogether too much attention 
to me.” 

“ He won’t trouble anybody now,” said 
Henry Haven. 

“I suggest,” said Nat, “as both sides had a 
shot at him, that we divide him between the 
two ships.” 

“ That is fair,” everybody said, and arrange- 


54 A SALT WATER HERO. 

ments were made for this division of the 
spoils. 

‘‘Where’s your vessel from?” inquired 
Henry Haven. 

“ We are from England — belong to that 
whaler back here,” said one of the strangers. 

“ Not all Johnny Bulls,” said the young 
Nimrod of color. “ I’m a Yankee ! ” 

“ Picked him up at St. John’s, where we 
called,” explained one of his companions. 

“ How do you find fishing this season ? ” 
asked Henry. 

Here followed a talk about the whaling 
season, and in the meantime some of the hunt- 
ers proceeded to cut up the big white quarry 
stretched out upon the ice. Joe and the col- 
ored stranger went off to the Ann Batten’s 
boat, halted there a minute, and then Joe ran 
back, saying to Henry and Nat, “ The Ann 
Batten has come up to us, you see, and I want 
to go off to her just while you are skinning and 
cutting up this game. I’ll be back in fifteen 
minutes.” 

“ All right ! ” said Henry. “ Don’t forget 
us!” 

“ And you going to take him ? ” said one of 
the Englishmen, pointing at Joe’s companion. 

“You guessed right,” replied Joe. “Just 


A BEAR HUNT. 55 

a fifteen-minutes’ trip while you are at work 
here.” 

** Aye, aye ! ” responded the Englishman. 

Joe and his companion quickly reached the 
Ann Batten, climbed the ship’s ladder, and 
went directly to the caboose. 

“ Pompey,” said Joe, “want to see some- 
body that is the image of me ? ” 

The old cook was carrying a pan of potatoes 
from the sink to the stove, but when he saw the 
young hunter who followed Joe, he dropped 
his potato-pan, and, rushing forward, threw his 
arms about the visitor, crying out, “ Oh, dar’s 
my Wash’n’t’n, my Wash’n’t’n ! How are ye, 
honey ? ” 

It was the beloved Washington, whose feat- 
ures Pompey had thought he saw reflected in 
Joe’s face. Joe out on the ice, had asked 
Washington certain questions that made it ad- 
visable to take him to the caboose. When 
Joe went back to the floe, Pompey accompa- 
nied the two young men and there made ar- 
rangements to call on his son, the next day, if 
the two whalers kept one another company ; if 
not, they planned to meet at Godhaven, in 
whose snug harbor the two vessels expeeted to 
drop anchor. 

That evening, Joe left the forecastle and 


56 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


started for Pompey’s caboose. When he reached 
the door of this warm shelter, he was about to 
enter, but he heard a voice within, and he hesi- 
tated. Pompey had opened one of the little 
sliding windows of the caboose, and a beam 
stole down from the white Arctic moon and 
rested like a silver crown on his locks as he 
bowed his head. Joe saw the old cook’s head 
and his crown of silver. He heard also a voice 
— the tones of prayer — for out of his full heart 
Pompey was returning thanks to God, whose 
loving care arches like the sky both land and 
sea, and had granted to the yearning heart of 
a weary father a sight again of his beloved boy. 


CHAPTER VI. 


THE CAPSIZED KAYAK. 

T here were three boys on board the Ann 
Batten — Joe Waters, Sam Peters, and 
Arnold Travers. Captain Grimes was very kind 
to those inexperienced youngsters. He would 
sometimes call them into his cabin, unroll a 
map of Greenland, and tell them something 
about this country which, as a whole, resem- 
bles almost anything save that which its name 
implies. 

One day he said, ‘‘ Boys, we are steadily go- 
ing up Davis’ Straits, fishing, as we go, and 
I want you to know a few of the names of the 
old Arctic navigators. John Davis was the 
man that discovered these straits, away back 
in the sixteenth century. Then there was 
William Baffin. Only think! He came over 
in i6l6 in a craft of less than sixty tons — fifty- 
five, if I remember rightly. He found out a 
good deal about Greenland, and we associate 
him with that narriQ— Baffin’s Bay. Then there 


58 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


is Kane, who visited this nook. I have seen 
him myself. He was a splendid explorer, coming 
in 1850 and 1853. Then there was his surgeon, 
Hayes. He was not satisfied with the taste he 
had had of Arctic experiences, and came in i860. 
He was the first man — I mean a civilized being 
— to visit what we call Ellesmere and Grinnell. 

“ A little later than the Ann Batten’s trip, 
there was Captain Hall, energetic and brave, 
who came up here in the Polaris. That was 
in 1871. That Arctic research lengthened out 
Greenland and Grinnell Land also ( the two be- 
ing on opposite sides of Kennedy Channel ), 
somewhat over a hundred miles. This was 
quite along stride toward the North Pole. It 
might be added that two Englishmen (Mark- 
ham and Parr), went farther in 1876, and it re- 
mained for Lockwood and Brainard, two of the 
famous Greely exploring party from America, 
in 1882, to plant the flag of Uncle Sam nearer 
the North Pole than any other flag has gone. 
About three hundred and fifty miles farther and 
the knob of the North Pole will be reached. I 
don’t believe it is worth the reaching unless, 
more valuable results be secured than have 
been turned out yet.” 

Captain Grimes having in his conference with 
his three boys brought forward the subject of 


THE CAPSIZED KAYAK. 


59 


the advisability of Arctic explorations, when 
the boys went out on deck they continued the 
discussion. 

“ I don't have much faith in those explora- 
tions,” exclaimed Sam Peters, a big, muscular 
fellow. Though only seventeen, he had the 
weight and strength of the average man at 
twenty-one. He was very impulsive, like Joe. 
In this particular, he was unlike Joe — he was 
both quick and hot. Joe in his hasty move- 
ments might part with his senses, but not his 
good-nature. To Sam’s remark made as above, 
Joe replied, “ Oh, I don’t know ; may be some- 
thing there. Of course we can’t have faith if 
we are not of the kind that can push out.” 

This was a remark in which he intended 
nothing personal, and was not thinking of Sam 
when he spoke. Sam picked it up at once like 
a man to whom has been presented a challenge. 

“ Guess I can push out as well as you can.” 

“ Hope you can better.” 

“ Guess I can do as well as you, running 
away from a bear ! Should be ashamed of my- 
self if I couldn’t do better.” 

That thorned Joe, but he kept his temper 
down by hard effort. The crew had joked him 
so much about it that he was now sensitive on 
the subject of bear-hunting. 


6o 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


The dispute apparently closed here, but for 
some reason Sam preferred to cherish the ill- 
feeling that had been aroused, and several times 
taunted Joe as the bear-hunter who was good 
at running away. Once he said, “ If I couldn’t 
show more sense than to chase a polar bear, in 
the first place, I would have spunk enough 
not to run. The men saw you crouching down 
on the ice and blubbering like a baby.” 

“Who blubbered ?” asked Joe, angrily. 

“ Plenty who heard you. Reg’lar cry-baby. ” 

Very opportunely, Capt. Grimes arrived about 
that time, and the altercation ended in two 
clouded faces and two low growls. 

The Ann Batten continued its hunt for 
whales up Davis’ Straits. 

American whalers frequent other waters now- 
adays, many going up into the Arctic waters 
on the Pacific side of the continent. Many 
English steam-whalers visit Greenland, for 
whaling “by steam ”is a favorite modern meth- 
od. The special reason why the owners sent 
the Ann Batten to Greenland was that they 
wanted after one more whaling-trip to sell her, 
and hoped to find a market for her at St. 
John’s on her return. To the cold waves 
that froth along the coast of Greenland the 
Ann Batten had gone, and she was meeting 


THE CAPSIZED KAYAK. 6 1 

with success sufficient to keep her good-nat- 
ured ; but it was not extraordinary “ luck.” 

“ Bound for Godhaven ! ” exclaimed Nat. 

“ We will show you what Greenland is,” 
added Henry Haven. 

Halting now and then to run down a whale, 
the Ann Batten pushed for the Greenland 
coast, with its chilling history, its chilling cli- 
mate, and its chilling glaciers ; one of these — 
the Great Glacier of Humboldt — measuring 
forty miles in breadth. 

As the glacier pushes down into the sea, the 
end thus projected is buoyed up, and then there 
is a break. The fragment thereby detached 
becomes one of those Arctic wanderers, an ice- 
berg, to go where winds and currents may take 
it, by and by dwindling to a piece of crystal 
no bigger than a pin-head, and then the last of 
the great, pretentious berg melts away and 
forever. 

One day the Ann Batten seemed to be 
steering directly for the wild shore of Disco 
Island, whose south coast towers about twenty- 
five hundred feet above the sea. 

“ Is the Cap’n running us aground ? ” won- 
dered Joe, looking off on the wild, rocky land, 
and the white, frothing waves. 

No ; in a few minutes there was an abrupt 


62 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


change in the vessel’s course, and lo ! a quiet 
harbor behind this almost hidden entrance ! 
Dwellings too could be seen. 

“ Hullo ! got to our journey’s end } ” said 
Joe to Henry. 

“Yes, this is what they call the Island of 
Disco, and those houses you see, they call ’em 
Lievely or Godhaven which means Good-har- 
bor,” said Henry. “ It is a snug harbor, you 
see. Many a poor feller has welcomed it and 
found it indeed a good harbor.” 

“What big hills!” exclaimed Joe, looking 
off on the wild, massive uplift of ledges here 
and there draped with the white snow. 

“ You want to climb them ? ” asked Henry. 

“ No, no ! I would like to see what’s going 
on in that village.” 

“ You will have a chance, Joe. I am going 
ashore. No temptation up here in Greenland 
to bother a man. This, you know, is a Danish 
town. Denmark owns all this land.” 

The “ town ” was quickly inspected by Joe, 
Nat and Henry, who went off together. There 
was a little church of wood, with sittings for 
sixty. Then there were half a dozen houses, 
also of wood, and a number of Eskimo homes 
built mostly of stone and turf. The black- 
smith too had a building where he could pound 


THE CAPSIZED KAYAK. 63 

his iron, and the cooper also had an opportun- 
ity to hammer his casks. 

“ I thought,” exclaimed Joe, "‘the Eskimos 
lived in ice houses.” 

“So they do, some of ’em. They pile up 
the ice real handy, I tell ye ; but these here 
are on the edge of civilization, you know,” 
replied Henry. 

“I would like to go into one,” said Joe. 
“ Come on ! ” 

There was an Eskimo, dressed in seal-skin, 
who was standing outside his door. With a 
grin he greeted the sailors, and, seeming to 
understand their wish, he beckoned and turned 
toward the door. The sailors followed him as 
he led the way through a long, low entrance 
shaped like a tunnel. They were almost 
obliged to crawl into this northern home. 

“ Oh, what a forec’stle ! ” exclaimed Henry 
as they reached the one living-room of the 
Eskimo house. “ Well, how are all the folks ? ” 

There was a good-natured murmur from the 
four Eskimos within, seated on a raised plat- 
form, and sewing on seal-skins. Joe noticed 
that there was a lining of wood to the walls, 
and he saw also one other feature of this 
Eskimo home — a Greenland lamp. Then he 
began to wish he was out of doors, so peculiar 


64 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


was the smell of the lamp, and so close was 
the place. He followed his inclination and 
hurried back through the contracted tunnel. 

“ Bah ! I had much rather have the air we 
get at sea!” thought Joe. He glanced at 
the windows of this hut. They were of glass, 
and an improvement on the old medium of 
seal-membrane, popular in Eskimo homes 
away from the resources of civilization. Ice 
windows are also used. 

‘‘Got enough of it?” asked Henry, now 
joining Joe. “ There are the houses of Dan- 
ish officials here, and they are quite home- 
like. Oh, look at those dogs! ” 

They were going in a pack, gaunt and surly 
and hungry-looking ; and yet how many of 
those very dogs may have already proved their 
rare merits ! In long journeys over the white 
ice under the cold, white stars, sleeping in a 
snow-drift, poorly-fed, cuffed and kicked, pull- 
ing a sledge through a pool of chilling sea- 
water, or bruising themselves against the 
sharp edges of hard ice-blocks, how much 
those very animals may have endured and 
achieved ! 

When the dogs had gone by, Joe was next 
interested in several boats of the natives, 
called kayaks. They seemed so frail and 


THE CAPS12ED ICAYAK. 6^ 

unsubstantial beside the stout boat that had 
brought him from the Ann Batten. 

“What are these things made of?” asked 
Joe. “Some sort of skin, I fancy.” 

“That Eskimo boat, Joe? Skin and 
whalebone, I guess,” replied Henry. 

His guess was correct. 

The boat of the Eskimo called “ kayak ” 
has a frame of whalebone or wood, and this is 
covered with the skin of the seal. In the 
centre of the seal-skin deck is a hole, and this 
receives the boatman. He has a dress of skin 
which is water-proof and is tightly fastened all 
about the edges of the hole in which he sits. 
If he go overboard, the water cannot come 
into the boat. “ But will he come up? ” some- 
one may ask. If he be an old hand at the 
business, he can turn a somersault in the water, 
boat and all, they say. 

While the young men were inspecting a 
kayak, Sam Peters came along. He and Joe 
were not yet in an amiable mood toward one 
another, for Sam had not retracted his charge 
that Joe was a coward. 

“ Got a kayak there ? ” said Sam, addressing 
Henry Haven. 

“ No, sir,” said Henry. 

“ But one is here,” replied Sam. 


66 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


“You asked if I had got a kayak," said 
Henry, who did not fancy Sam anyway, and 
still less since the manifestation of his disposi- 
tion to abuse Joe. 

“ Some folks are very particular," remarked 
Sam, stepping into the kayak. 

“ I don’t think you are," said Henry. “ I’d 
advise you to let that boat alone." 

“ We will see," replied Sam, pushing off and 
defiantly grasping an Eskimo paddle and at- 
tempting to work it. This was double-bladed 
and tipped with bone. Hurrahing and shout- 
ing “ Look here ! " Sam boastfully worked his 
paddle. 

“ Looks just like an Eskimo ! ’’ said Henry ; 
and this assertion was quite accurate. Sam 
had a broad, fat face, rather low forehead, flat 
nose, small, black eyes, and if his complexion 
could have been Eskimo-tinted, he would have 
made a good specimen of a Greenlander. He 
had gone about a hundred feet from the shore 
when he made an awkward, abrupt dip with his 
paddle, and over he went ! There was a vio- 
lent contortion of the overturned kayak, but 
no Sam could be seen. The next moment, 
Joe was kicking off his stout cow-hide boots 
and tossing aside his heavy monkey-jacket. 
Then running along a point of land whose 


THE CAPSIZED KAYAK. 


67 


extremity was not more than twenty feet from 
the upset, unseen, but still struggling Sam, he 
bravely plunged into the cold waters of God- 
haven harbor. He wanted to say, “ Here I am, 
Sam ! ” but Sam could not hear to an advan- 
tage down under that bobbing kayak. While 
Joe was gripping the boat and trying to pull 
it away from the occupant, whose legs were 
twisted under it, Henry and Nat were excitedly 
rowing the Ann Batten’s boat forward to 
the rescue. 

“ 'Most there ! ” cried Henry, looking round. 
“ Harder on your oar, Nat ! Got two to fish 
out! Hold! Now, back water! Here we 
are ! ” 

No one of the three rescuers could ever say 
how it was they got Sam out of the water. 
Henry and Nat seized the kayak and tried to 
lift it off from the struggling boatman, and 
Joe was trying to lend a helping hand wherever 
he could see any chance for its use. It seemed 
as if a sea-serpent had come into Godhaven 
harbor and had twisted a dusky fold of its cold, 
slimy body about Sam, and it was a question 
which would beat, the snake or the sailor. 

“ He — he — will drown, boys ! ” shouted 
Joe; and his frantic appeal made the rescuers 
work still more violently. At last, Sam and 


68 


A SALT WATER HERO, 


the kayak were separated. The duel between 
snake and sailor was over, and — had the snake 
triumphed.^ The ugly, dusky fold moved to 
one side, and the detached body of the sailor 
came up next the Ann Batten’s boat. 

‘‘ Grip him, boys ! ” shouted Nat ; and while 
Nat and Henry pulled, Joe shoved. Between 
the pulling and the shoving, the heavy body of 
Sam Peters was landed in the Ann Batten’s 
boat. Then Nat and Henry helped Joe 
aboard. 

'‘Quick! Afraid Sam is gone!” shouted 
Henry. “Turn him over on his face, head 
down ! Let me get the water out of him ! 
Nat, pull for the ship quick as you can ! 
Joe, you ” 

“ I’ll help Nat ! I’ll pull an oar ! ” said the 
dripping Joe, thinking the most effective 
service he could render was to get Sam to the 
Ann Batten as quickly as possible. 

While Henry went to work on the uncon- 
scious Sam, the others rowed as vigorously as 
possible, leaving the recovery of the kayak and 
Joe’s property until a subsequent trip could 
be made. 

“ As narrow a chance as ever I see,” ex- 
claimed Capt. Grimes, when Sam had been 
brought aboard. Henry, while Sam was lying 


THE CAPSIZED KAYAK. 69 

across the seats of the boat, his head down, had 
been pressing heavily upon Sam’s back to force 
out of him any water that had been sw’allowed. 
Captain Grimes continued this process, and, 
Sam’s clothing having been removed, his body 
was energetically rubbed with dry, warm flan- 
nels. Pompey brought bottles of hot water for 
Sam’s feet. Sam was also placed upon his 
back, and efforts to induce free respiration 
were made by pressing upon the waist, and 
then the pressure was removed. This process 
was repeated many times. The purpose was in 
all possible ways to get water out of the body 
and to get air in. 

“He — he is breathing!” exclaimed Capt. 
Grimes to the excited group of helpers and 
spectators. Restoratives were also applied, 
and Sam put to bed. 

“ He will do, I think ! ” said Capt. Grimes, 
shaking his head emphatically. 

Before the sun went down, Sam said, “ Oh, 
I can’t stay here 1 I want to be up. 

A tender of a suit of seal-skin was accepted 
from Pompey, who had traded for one with an 
Eskimo that morning. Dressed in the warm 
seal-skin, Sam was granted a seat on the bench 
in Pompey ’s caboose. In the meantime, Joe 
had gone into dry, warm clothing. His prop- 


70 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


erty on shore was recovered, and the drifting 
kayak was rescued and towed home. 

Sam never taunted Joe with cowardice 
after that day. It was a mortifying experience 
for Sam, and a healthy one also. It had a 
humorous ending. Dressed in seal-skin, as he 
was sitting in the door of Pompey’s caboose, 
he was seen by an Eskimo who had come off 
to the whaler to effect a little domestic trade, 
exchanging seal-skin for sugar, needles and a 
knife. He looked sharp at Sam. 

“Ugh! ugh! ugh!” he grunted several 
times and shook his head emphatically. 

The next day he returned with a party of 
his countrymen, who, through an interpreter, 
asserted that Sam was a runaway relative and 
must come home. He certainly looked like a 
very near and dear friend of those seal-clad 
aborigines. 


CHAPTER VII. 


NIPPED. 



HE Ann Batten had a successful search for 


X whales and having snugly packed in her 
hull her treasure of oil, she one day shook loose 
all her white robes, and stately and imposing 
as any dame of the sea that ever came home 
from a whaling voyage, started for St. John’s, 
Newfoundland. In her company was another 
whaler, the George Augustus, and bound for the 
same port. Her captain was one William 
Hartwell, and English like his crew. 

The fishing season was over. Both crews 
welcomed the thought of a return home, and 
the decks of the two vessels echoed with the 
careless laugh, and the happy songs of these men 
to whom life now presented itself as a vacation. 
That was the aspect of things one afternoon at 
least. Toward night there was a stiffening of 
the weather. The wind changed and blew 
savagely. The Ann Batten’s crew shuffled 
around the deck, muffled in their thickest, 


72 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


heaviest clothing, looking like bears that had 
organized an attack upon the Ann Batten, had 
driven off her crew, and taken possession of 
her deck. The sea had been dotted with 
drifting masses of ice. These now multiplied 
rapidly. They increased in size. Were they 
growing as by a vegetable process, shooting up, 
swelling out, a kind of rapidly developing crop 
of ice-mushrooms? 

Were they instinct with a purpose, animated 
by a savage determination to move down upon 
and crush these two unprotected vessels ? It 
almost seemed in the thickening of these hos- 
tile Arctic masses and in their growing savage- 
ness, as if they were tenanted by malicious 
spirits, evil-minded giants, ugly demons, who, 
concealed behind those icy walls, were directing 
every movement with a most grim and savage 
purpose. Life now was anything but a vaca- 
tion. 

“ I don’t like the looks of things at all,” 
Joe heard Capt. Grimes say to one of his 
mates. “ The ice is just coming down on us 
and we shall be nipped surely.” 

This opinion spread among the crew and 
occasioned much discussion. 

“Did you ever see a ‘ nip ’ ? ” said Joe to 
Henry Haven. 


NIPPED. 


73 


Henry gave his head an assenting shake and 
put on that air of superior wisdom which an 
old sailor knows so well how to assume before 
a young one. 

“ The vessel, I suppose, Henry, gets squeezed . 
in that case pretty effectually?” 

** I guess so. It is my opinion that the 
Ann Batten will have to take such a squeeze. ” 
Do you think so really?” 

Another affirmative head-shake, and a second 
look of superior wisdom. 

‘‘What can prevent our being crushed, 
Henry?” 

“ Nothing, if the ice gets its mind made up 
that way. As it is, we have a chance to lie in 
the lee of an iceberg that will keep off the other 
ice, or we may have just enough open water to 
lie in, and our ice-anchors keep us off from the 
pack itself, or — well, I guess we shall weather 
this point somehow. However, we are in for 
a nip now.” 

The next morning, Henry’s words were veri- 
fied. The Ann Batten was fairly caught in the 
ice. When the sun arose to throw his short- 
lived splendor across the Arctic waste, he shone 
upon an immense pack of ice in which the two 
whalers were wedged. The dazzle of the sun- 
shine was so great that Dick could not gaze 


74 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


upon it long. As the ice here and there caught 
up the sun’s rays, it turned them into diamonds. 
Joe thought of those verses in the book of 
the Revelation saying, “ And the foundations 
of the wall of the city were garnished with all 
manner of precious stones. The first founda- 
tion was jasper ; the second, sapphire ; the third, 
a chalcedony ; the fourth, an emerald ; the fifth, 
sardonyx ; the sixth, sardius ; the seventh, chry- 
solite ; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, topaz ; the 
tenth, a chrysoprasus ; the eleventh, a jacinth ; 
the twelfth, an amethyst.” 

The transient sun went into a cloud, and 
this New Jerusalem-glory departed also. 

The captains of the two whalers had a con- 
ference. Each said he thought that one thing 
might and must be done in behalf of his vessel’s 
interests ; ** She can be, must be, sawed out.” 

The two crews went to work at once. Ice 
saws were brought out. The work was syste- 
matized. There were those who sawed. There 
were those who pried and lifted and dragged 
the sawed blocks of ice out of the way. The 
remaining men towed the ships along the 
channel thus opened. Between ship and ship 
stretched an open water-way and this was 
extended toward the southern edge of the pack. 

The captain of the George Augustus came 


NIPPED. 


75 


over to Capt. Grimes* crew, his arms filled with 
bottles, and as he termed it, made a “ proposi- 
tion.** 

Cap*n Grimes ! ** 

** What say, Cap*n Hartwell I ** 

** I got something for ye.** 

Here the captain of the George Augustus 
looked bland and benevolent, smiled and 
grinned, till it seemed as if this red, jolly face 
were the sun himself that coming out of all 
cloudy concealment now showed himself to 
his admirers. 

Capt. Hartwell laid his bottles down upon 
the ice. 

** There, Cap*n Grimes, I have been a-keepin* 
these for ‘ a nip,* an ‘ upset * or something of 
the kind and you just give out a ration or so to 
your men. The grog will stiffen ’em up to their 
work, I tell ye.** 

** Thank you, Cap*n Hartwell. You are very 
kind. I’ll send them on board ship, and soon 
as work is over, let one of the men take the bot- 
tles to your ship, but — I don’t think I had bet- 
ter give my men a grog-ration.** 

“ What, you never do? ** 

That’s the way of it, Cap’n ! ** 

“ You think there is something better ? ** 

** I certainly do. Tea or coffee or cold water 
will be much better for them.** 


76 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


‘‘You one of them fellers?” 

“There are good many like me, men who have 
sailed these seas, and they say spirits are not 
necessary if you want to help men work, and a 
drink like tea is better for them. Then I have 
men who if they got a taste of liquor and could 
get any more of it, they would give us a lot of 
trouble ” 

“ But they can’t get at the ‘ more.’ ” 

“ I don’t want them to get any ” 

“ But it is a special case. They are working 
hard.” 

“ I know it, and I am working hard also ” 

“ And a little sip of tea will do for you ? ” 

“Yes, tea or coffee.” 

“ Tea !” said Capt. Hartwell, spitefully. He 
did not say it as smoothly as that, but he tried to 
spit it out, and when it seemed to stick between 
his teeth as if a mouthful of dry tea-leaves 
were there, he sputtered away, “ T -t-t-tea ! 
T-t-t-tea ! ” Still sputtering, he hugged his 
bottles and moved off. 

“ Cap’n ! Cap’n ! ” cried Captain Grimes. 
“ Hold on ! I’ll send a man back with those 
bottles. Hold on ! ” 

But the skipper of the George Augustus was 
mad all the way through. 

“ N-n-n-no sir! I’ll take ’em myself. It 


NIPPED. 77 

might poison your men if they drank any of it. 
T-t-tea is what they want ! ” 

Hugging more tightly his bottles, he wad- 
dled off, every minute or two ejaculating with 
a spiteful sputter, “ T-t-t-ea ! T-t-tea ! ” 

Joe and Henry Haven were working near 
Capt. Grimes, and they caught enough of the 
discussion to tell its subject. 

They watched the angry skipper as he moved 
off with his goods. Others watched him. Very 
soon all the Ann Batten’s men at work under- 
stood the reason of the English captain’s visit 
and the nature of the load in his arms. A dis- 
cussion began at once and soon became general. 
The majority of the Ann Batten’s crew sided 
with their captain. Among these were Joe 
Waters, Nat Perry and Henry Haven. Among 
those that differed from the captain was Sam 
Peters. He on his side of the debate was the 
leader. 

Humph ! ” he ejaculated. ’Tain’t perlite 
to refuse a thing when it is offered to ye, when 
it is brought all the way for us. Made him 
cut a pretty figger a-luggin’ that all the way 
back.” 

But he need not ! ” replied Joe. 

“ No,” said Henry. “ The cap’n said a man 
could take them over. Now wasn’t that po- 


78 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


lite to offer to send them back ? And wasn’t 
Cap’n Hartwell impolite to refuse the offer, 
Sam? ” 

“ Cap’n Grimes began the imperliteness.” 

“Well, Cap’n Hartwell ought not to have 
followed it up, ” asserted Henry. 

“ Our skipper don’t know the A B C of 
perliteness,” declared Sam. 

“ See here ! ” exclaimed Henry. “ I don’t 
think it is polite to do anything that troubles 
another’s interests. It wouldn’t be polite for 
me to put my hand in your pocket and take 
out any money.” 

“ Wouldn’t find any if you did put your paw 
there,” sang out a voice. 

The men laughed. 

“That pint don’t have anything to do with 
the case. We ain’t talkin’ about puttin’ hands 
in pockets,” shouted Sam testily. 

“ That is what it amounts to,” said Henry. 
“ The capn’ thinks liquor would hurt the crew, 
hurt their worth to the owners, and what hurts 
that worth is so much money out of the pocket. 
You may say his pocket, for if the cap’n brings 
back a good cargo of oil, it will be because he 
kept his crew up to the line all the time. If he 
don’t do that, his cargo feels it, and he will feel 
it. Owners won’t want him again. Besides that. 


NIPPED. 


79 


he will feel it in his pocket another way and 
very quick too. He is part owner of the vessel 
and of her load of oil, and the better the state 
of the crew, the bigger will be her load of oil 
and there will be more money in his pocket, 
won’t there ? Harm the crew — and that’s what 
liquor does! I know it. I like it well as any 
body and have had to suffer for it. And — and 

“Come, come, men!” called out Capt. 
Grimes, stepping up to the disputants. “ Work 
away ! If you don’t, we shall never get out 
of this pack ! Here’s our Ann Batten ! ’Most 
towed up to us ! Saw away ! ” 

Yes, there was the whaler slowly advancing, 
her big hull slipping easily along the water-way 
opened for her, her tall masts, her heavy yards 
looming up against the chilling Arctic sky. In a 
slow, stately way, the Ann Batten was moving. 

The men went to their work again. The 
whizz of the saws was heard, slowly, steadily 
slashing their way through the ice. 

“ Make a lot of coffee ! ” Capt. Grimes had 
told Pompey, the cook. ** Bring it to us hot ! 
Cold, out here ! ” 

While Capt. Grimes was distributing rations 
of hot coffee, Capt. Hartwell was passing his 
cold grog. 


8o 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


“This isn’t tea, I want you to understand,” 
he often sang out. “ More nerve in this ! ” 

He gave out frequent rations and seeing Joe 
Waters who chanced accidently to be among 
his men, invited this member of the Ann Bat- 
ten’s crew to share in the good fortune as he 
considered it, of those in the George Augustus. 

“I thank you, Cap’n, but I never drink,” re- 
plied Joe. 

“ Oh, you a tea-man ? ” said Capt. Hartwell 
sneeringly, contemptuously. 

“Cold water, anyway, sir,” replied Joe, re- 
solved to be honest as his father had recom- 
mended, and openly declare his opinions. 

“Nonsense, boy! Take this,” said the cap- 
tain, pettishly. 

“ No, I thank you ! ” replied Joe, courteously 
but firmly. 

Capt. Hartwell was furious. He had a crook 
to one of his eyes, also a bull kind of a nose, and 
a big mouth corresponding with a beard which 
was very large for a man of his age, only twenty- 
two. All these peculiar features, the crooked 
eye, the bull nose, the capacious mouth, the big 
red beard, he was excitably working till Joe 
declared to himself, “ Capt. Hartwell looks like 
a fright.” 

“ I will remember you,” roared Capt. Hart- 


NIPPED. 


8l 


well, and this story will show that he kept his 
word. 

Joe was glad to withdraw from his presence 
from all the circle of noisy fellows too, and slip 
back among the quiet but hard working men 
of the Ann Batten. 

“ They are gittin’ a leetle sot of excited,” 
said an old seaman to Joe. “ They will git on 
more sail than they can comfortably carry.” 

One at least was thus encumbered with 
extra canvas. It was the very captain of the 
George Augustus. The liquor that went into 
his mouth, seemed to run up into his brains. 
He became talkative, rattling away. He 
told stories, a mood unusual for him. He 
sang, but a note that was musical, was as far 
beyond his ability as it would have exceeded a 
pig’s. He would give an occasional grunt from 
sheer excitement, then lapse into a mood of 
silence, breaking out into a silly laugh or a 
senseless story. There was a breaking out into 
a serious extravagance at last. Between the 
two whale-ships was the lane of water opened 
by the men. The Ann Batten was the lighter 
and more graceful of the two ships. It preceded 
the George Augustus, like some vivacious 
female leading off and coaxing on her lingering 
spouse. 


82 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Into the cleared highway, a third craft was 
now launched, even a cake of ice. Upon this 
sprang the inebriated captain of the George 
Augustus. He flourished a long wooden bar 
with which he had been shoving the sawed but 
motionless masses of ice. This bar he now 
turned into a paddle and amid the shouts of 
his crew began an exciting voyage on the cake 
of ice. Hearing the noise, the crew of the Ann 
Batten looked up from their work and watched 
Captain Hartwell’s progress. 

‘‘Joe,” said Captain Grimes, “that foolish 
fellow will get into the water.” 

“ He’s doing his best to get there, sir,” 
replied Joe. 

Now shouting, then singing, the navigator 
of the block of ice flourished his bar, and all 
the spectators belonging to the George Augus- 
tus crazily applauded him. 

Another minute, he had missed his footing 
and slidden off the slippery ice into the waters. 
Captain Grimes and Joe were hurriedly carrying 
a plank at the time. This plank was used by 
the men to span any surfaces of water opening 
amid the ice as their work went on. 

“ This way, Joe ! ” shouted Captain Grimes. 
“We can run the plank out to that cake of ice.” 

“ Aye, aye, sir ! ” 


NIPPED. 


83 


The plank was quickly run out to the drifting 
block, and Captain Grimes and Joe, springing 
forward, gripped by the collar the unlucky 
marineer while he was trying to crawl out 
upon the block. It was slippery and he was 
befuddled, and if he had been left to himself, 
or his rescue had been entrusted to his bewil- 
dered crew, he might never have again occupied 
his snug berth in his old-fashioned cabin. 

“ There she blows ! somebody had cried out, 
seeing this puffing piece of humanity in the 
water. Others laughed, but the matter had 
its very serious side. 

“ Here you are ! cried Captain Grimes, 
laying a powerful hand on the Englishman’s 
collar. “Up with ye now ! ” 

“ Yes, up with ye ! ” responded Joe, tugging 
on his side. 

Such a mortifying deliverance ! The res- 
cued man was indignant because Joe and 
his captain had laid their hands on him. 

“ I — could-d-der-get out without you two ! ” 
he shouted. 

“ Maybe, but as a matter of fact you certainly 
did get — out — with us,” impulsively replied 
Joe. 

This maddened the master of the George 
Augustus. 


84 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


‘‘Who — who — are you f he shouted to 
Joe. “Get off my — ’’ship, he was going to 
say, but he changed the form of the order 
and thundered in the ears of Joe, “Go 
ashore ! ” 

The three seamen still were on the cake of ice. 

If Captain Hartwell had spent his wrath 
simply in this manufacture of thunder, no harm 
would have come of it, but he also seized Joe, 
shoved him, and although Captain Grimes and 
Joe both tried to right matters and save the 
equilibrium of the ice as well as their own, all 
was in vain, and the three went down into an 
Arctic bath. 

There were three men on board the Ann 
Batten who had not only watched with interest 
the attempt of their captain and Joe to 
rescue the upset navigator, but had quietly pre- 
pared to meet the next emergency. Brown, 
the mate, had ordered a boat to be lowered, 
and with Henry Haven and Nat Perry quickly 
rowed along the lane to the rescue. 

It was an almost comical scene they 
witnessed. 

“ Hold him ! Don’t let him go ! ” cried Cap- 
tain Grimes to Joe, as if the skipper of the 
George Augustus were a thief trying to get 
away. 


NIPPED. 85 

“ Aye, aye, sir ! I’ve got him ! ” obediently 
replied Joe. 

“ Hands-s-off-f ! Lemme go-s-s-sirs-s ! ” 
sputteringly shrieked the other captain, unwill- 
ing to give up the idea that he could save him- 
self, though he never would have reached the 
deck of his ship if it had not been for the help 
he received. The Ann Batten’s boat now came 
up, and those in the water were pulled out of 
it. 

But how wrathy was the master of the 
George Augustus ! As his cold bath brought 
him nearer and nearer to a state of sobriety, 
the sharper was his sense of mortification to 
think he had not fished himself out of the sea. 
With Joe, he was specially angry. He 
kept spitting out such phrases as, “ Ridicu- 
lous ! ” “ To think of it ! ” The idea ! “ That 
boy!” If he’d been an officer ! ” “Boy! To 
think of it ! ” 

He went off in wrath to the George Augus- 
tus, his cold, heavy, wet, freezing clothes mak- 
ing a harsh, disagreeable, rustling sound. 

“ I won’t forget that boy who refused my 
grog and dared lay his hand on me in the 
water,” he muttered. “ I won’t forget him.” 

Forget him, he never did. 

The Ann Batten and the George Augustus 


86 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


did not remain long in prison. After a lapse 
of twenty-four hours, came a wind from the 
south. It sent up the temperature, and soon 
the ice-floe hemming in the two whalers, 
began to break up. The icy wall around these 
showed rents and gaps, as if cannon had been 
bombarding it. The lanes that the seamen had 
been opening, speedily widened and length- 
ened, and finally the Ann Batten and her mate 
hoisting their canvas steered for the broad, 
open water beyond. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


LOST ON THE ICE-FIELD. 

I T was snowing hard. 

Luckily, it was not a cold snow-storm. 

But it was snow, and it snowed everywhere. 
There was a universal whiteness, under 
foot and around, while overhead there was 
one ceaselessly-moving, everywhere-extending 
cloud of soft white flakes. In the midst of 
it, were two of the “ boys ” of the Ann Batten, 
Joe Waters and Percy James. They were in 
the lee of a big hummock of ice, slowly mov- 
ing about for the simple reason that they had 
nothing else to do. Percy James was the 
younger of the two, with a much slighter 
frame, large, dark eyes, and hair that seemed 
animated by much will and could not be per- 
suaded to grow straight or stay smooth, but 
was ever in a luxuriant tangle of locks. He 
was a boy that had a certain style of pictu- 
resque beauty. He and Joe had instinctively 
and abruptly become friends at the time that 


88 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


the Ann Batten and George Augustus had 
made one another’s acquaintance. Percy 
formerly belonged to the George Augustus. 
Looking over the rail of his vessel one day, 
Percy saw Joe Waters walking on the ice. 

‘‘ Say ! may — may I go with you ? ” called 
out Percy abruptly to this blue-eyed boy with 
a generous, frank face, one whom Percy had 
never seen before but somehow liked at once. 
Joe looked up. 

“ Oh, that curly-haired boy speaking ? Now 
I like his looks somehow,” thought Joe, and 
he sang out, “ Aye, aye ! Come along ! ” The 
boys were close friends from that hour. 

One day, Percy said, “ I don’t like on board 
the George Augustus very well, though the 
cap’ll is a relative of mine. Wonder if I 
couldn’t ship on board the Ann Batten ? ” 

“Come on! Let’s fix it up right off ! Don’t 
like to have things hanging round long,” said 
Joe in his impetuous way. 

There was an English boy on board the 
American Ann Batten who wanted a place in 
the English George Augustus and he gave his 
berth to this English boy, Percy James, who 
wanted a place beside Joe Waters. The 
affections of the two boys were twined about 
one another like the tendrils of two adjacent 


LOST ON THE ICE-FIELD. 89 

vines. Joe was the older, the stouter, and 
in character the stronger. Percy was not 
rugged. The sea was too rough for him. The 
life of a sailor is a hard one at the easiest. 
Percy James never ought to have attempted 
that life. One attraction about Joe Waters 
was that still a boy he could feel for and sym- 
pathize with a boy who thought that the stroke 
of the sea-winds, when gentle even, was some- 
thing like a soft tap from a bear’s paw, and 
suggesting that the next contact might have 
all the ferocity of the ursine nature. 

In the growing intimacy of the two boys, 
they would whenever possible share one 
another’s work on board ship, and in any 
adventures outside of the ship they were sure 
to be companions, taking Nat Perry whenever 
they could get him. The Ann Batten was 
still much hindered by the ice and any move- 
ment was slow. One day, she was moored by 
her ice-anchors to a floe that threatened to bar 
her way for a disagreeable length of time. 

Percy discovered seals on this floe and 
begged of Captain Grimes a chance to go 
a-sealing. 

From where I come from, Newfoundland, 
Cap’n, lots of people go a-sealing, and some of 
my relations too. I have heard so much about 


90 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


it, I think I would like to go on the ice and 
try my hand.” 

“ What have you got to kill the seals with ? ” 

“ Oh, at one of the Eskimo villages, I traded 
for a steel spear like what the Eskimos have. 
I have that and I can take it, sir." 

“ Well ! keep near the ship. Don’t stay 
long." 

“ May Joe go too, sir? " 

Yes." 

** Nat Perry ?" 

Can’t spare him." 

Two happy boys stepped out upon the ice, 
Percy carrying his steel spear. The floe was 
very uneven. Rough, high hummocks would 
alternate with strips of smooth ice. Here and 
there were pools of water in one of which 
Percy expected to find his prey. 

It was an unsuccessful hunt, and in the 
meantime it began to snow. 

** Guess, Percy, we had better go back to 
the Ann Batten," said Joe. 

Where is it, Joe? ” 

‘‘ Oh, it is ’’ 

When Joe tried to point it out, he was 
utterly unable to do so. On every side was a 
wall of snowflakes, but there was no Ann Bat- 
ten ! 



TWO HAPPV BOYS STEPPED OUT UPON THE ICE. 


Page QO 





LOST ON THE ICE-FIELD. 


91 


“ This is mortifying, Percy.” 

** It is my fault, Joe.” 

No, it is mine.” 

This mutual assumption of responsibility 
showed a generous, unselfish spirit, but it did 
not find the Ann Batten. 

The two boys looked at one another soberly. 

“ Percy, we ought to have taken a compass,” 
said Joe. 

“ Yes, but we didn’t, Joe, and we have got 
tQ do without.” 

“ Well, Percy, we will do one thing. We 
will mark the spot where we are ; that will be 
one point looked after. If we don’t know 
where we are going, we will know where we 
started from. There is that hummock near 
us. Let us pile these loose blocks of ice on 
top.” 

“Come on! I don’t care! We shall come 
out all right.” 

If Joe were near him, Percy felt that he 
must come out right anyway. It pleased Joe 
at whom generally were thrown by his mates 
such encouraging adjectives as “impulsive,” 
“ reckless,” “too daring.” 

Joe now worked under a new sense of 
responsibility, and he worked resolutely. 

“You may get up there, Joe, and make 


92 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


believe you are the mason. I am the hod- 
carrier and will bring you materials, some 
brick, stone, mortar and so on. Call out to 
me if you get short ! ” 

“ Aye, aye ! ” 

Joe’s hummock was about twelve feet high. 
Taking a block with him, he gained the top of 
the hummock, and sang out, “ Good, Percy ! 
Here is some loose ice up here ! ” 

Joe piled away, occasionally singing out 
** More mort ! ” to the carrier of this crystal 
mortar, and often descending to a humble level 
to play the part of a hod-carrier himself. 

When the boys had finished, they stood off 
on the floe and looked at their completed 
work. 

** Why ! ” Percy cried out. “ It looks like 
a cross.” 

“ So it does. I didn’t think of it when I was 
up there.” 

** It makes me think of a cross on our church 
at home. It looks homelike.” 

Does it ? Well, now we know where we 
are, or, when we get back here, we shall know 
where we started.” 

Yes, and it would keep them from getting 
farther astray. 

“ Well, Percy, keeping in sight of this gross, 


LOST ON THE ICE-FIELD. 93 

we will start off and just sweep a circle round 
the hummock and see what we will come 
to.” 

** Come on ! I like this.” Percy’s dark eyes 
lighted up with excitement, as if holding dia- 
monds in their depths. The boys started off 
and swept a circle round the hummock. 

“Keep that cross in sight, Joe!” Percy 
would exclaim. “ It looks like home.” 

“ I won’t lose sight of it.” 

Through the veil of descending flakes, they 
could see the form of that cross, and when 
they might find it was vanishing, they would 
run toward it till, through the veil, it began to 
rise again in clearer outline. They had almost 
made the circuit of the hummock when Percy 
called out, “ I see water ! ” 

“ Where ? ” 

“ There ! ” replied Percy, pointing with his 
hand. 

The boys were running toward it, when 
Percy cried, “ Oh, the cross ! ” 

It was going out of sight. 

‘‘We won’t lose that, Percy! Here, you 
stay where you can see it, and I will go to the 
water, or I will not go so far as to get out of 
sight of you.” 

One boy stood where he could see the faith- 


94 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


ful cross. The other kept the first boy in sight, 
and advanced toward the water. 

“ See a ship, Joe ? ” 

‘‘ Nothing, Percy ! ’’ 

Joe saw only white flakes above, and cold, 
dark water below. 

“ I am going to call, Percy ! They may hear 
me on board the ship ! '' 

Joe’s voice rang out, “ Hul-lo-o-o-o ! ” 

No response ! 

After it as before, only snow-flakes, dark, 
chilling water, and the ice-field on which Joe 
stood. 

“I will call, Joe!” 

Percy’s voice was shriller. Joe felt at once 
that Percy’s sharp “ Hul-lo-o-o ! ” would cut 
deeper into the great mass of dropping flakes. 

And hark ! 

What did Joe catch? 

The tones of a human voice ? 

He started forward excitedly. 

Hear that, Percy? ” 

“ I heard something.” 

“ Call again, Percy ! ” 

He called and then they both listened. 
Through the snow came a response, a faint 
“ HuUo-o ! ” 

It was repeated, and the boys called again. 

The reply was louder now. 


LOST ON THE ICE-FIELD. 95 

Soon the boys saw an indistinct, pillar-like ob- 
ject nearing them. Its outlines grew sharper, 
duskier, became a man, and then turned into 
Nat Perry saying, “ Oh, that you, boys ?” 

“ Why, Nat, if I ain’t glad to see you ! ” ex- 
claimed Joe. ‘‘ Where did you come from ? ” 

“Ask me where I am going, for I don’t 
know. Glad am I to see somebody or some- 
thing that looks natural! Where’s the ship? ” 

“ We don’t know,” said Percy. 

“And I am sure I don’t,” replied Nat. 
“ Let us shake hands over our misfortune.” 

The boys all laughed and shook hands over 
their common bewilderment. 

“ We came out to hunt seals, Nat.” 

“Joe, that is what — what I came out to find. 
After you left, cap’n said I might go, and you 
are the first living thing I have seen. Then 
you found the water?” 

“ Yes, we got here at last.” 

“ Thanks to that friend,” said Percy. 

“What friend ? ” asked Nat. 

Percy pointed toward the cross-like top of 
the hummock. 

“ Oh, the hummock ? ” 

“ Its top, like a cross. I told Joe it 
made me think of the cross on the church at 


home.” 


96 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


** Well, the question is, where is home ? ” 

They looked at one another with a puzzled 
air, and silently grinned. 

“ I can say one thing, boys. If that water 
means we have got to the edge of the floe, the 
Ann Batten is somewhere moored to it,'" said 
Nat, “ and by following it, we shall come to it.” 

“ Follow which way asked Joe. 

“ Come to the edge of the floe,” replied Nat, 
“ and let’s see about it there, boys.” 

They followed Nat who said, “ Now I ought 
to find some little ice-heaps near the water, for 
I piled up a few. We shan’t find them if the 
snow has covered them much, but I guess it is 
hardly deep enough. I made the heaps for 
way-marks.” 

The boys hunted patiently and at last Percy 
asked, “ What’s this ? ” 

The snow had enveloped it, but when this 
was brushed away, Nat said, ‘‘ This looks like 
one.” 

‘‘ Now where do we go to find the next one, 
in which direction along the floe ? ” asked 
Joe. ‘‘Seems to me if the ship is anywhere 
near, they must have heard some of us when 
we were hollering so. And that gives me an 
idea about your ice-heaps, Nat. We are to the 
leeward of the ship, and the wind carries from 


Lost ON THE ICJE-FIeLD. 97 

it the sound of all our voices. Else they would 
have heard us and shouted an answer to us. 
The ship, then, is not in this direction, but 
that — ” Here Joe stretched out his hand and 
made a pointer of it — and most of the ice- 
heaps we shall surely find in that direction, 
and following them, we shall come to the ship.’' 
“ Good ! ” said Nat. “ Good ! ” 

Percy said nothing, but his eyes sparkled. 
“ Nat Perry is a pretty good sailor I guess, but 
get him on to the ice and Joe beats him,” was 
Percy’s thought. 

“ Come on, boys ! ” Nat was shouting. ** Joe 
knows more about the way to go than I do.” 

They all tramped away, hoping it was ship- 
ward, but looking anxiously to find another ice- 
heap. And they found one. 

Here, boys,” cried Nat, “ is another of my 
heaps. The snow has almost covered it up, 
but here it is. Joe is right so far.” 

Ere long, Percy shouted, '‘And Joe is right 
again. Here is another heap ! ” 

This was encouraging. On one side might 
be that dark, chilling strip of Arctic water, the 
veil of the snow falling down over it. On the 
other side, might be only an ice-field upon 
which winter was piling up every hour deeper 
and deeper drifts, no sign of human, or even 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


98 

animal life anywhere appearing. Still ahead, 
they hoped, was the ship, the Ann Batten, 
a home, a mother ! There were snug berths, a 
warm galley-fire, and lots of company ! 

So they trudged forward hopefully, uncover- 
ing successive ice-heaps, and at last, though 
after a longer tramp than they had anticipated, 
rose up the tapering masts of the Ann Batten ! 
What a beloved object ! 

“ Hur-rah ! Hur-rah ! Hur-rah!” they 
shouted. 

“Hur-rah!*' came from the ship’s deck in 
response. 

“ I never saw anything look so homelike as 
this old tub ! ” declared Joe. 

“Yes, she looks good ! *' said Nat. 

“ But Joe was the one who knew most about 
how to get here,” thought Percy. 

“We were worried about you, boys,” said 
Captain Grimes. “ One party has already 
been off for you, and here they come now ! ” 

Four men, looking like Arctic bears waddling 
on their hind legs, now appeared in sight. 

“All here, Henry! They’ve got home!” 
shouted the captain. 

“ If they haven’t, we can’t tell you where they 
are,” replied Henry Haven, one of the four. 
“ Glad Joe and Percy have got home.” 


LOST ON THE ICE-FIELD. 99 

Yes, everything did seem homelike, and 
everybody was unusually cordial. Joe and 
Percy had berths in the boys’ quarters, and the 
captain told them to go there for a rest. Nat 
Perry went to his berth in the forecastle. 

Joe and Percy had the boys’ quarters to 
themselves for the next watch. A part of this 
respite they took in sleep, but it was prefaced 
by a talk as they lay in adjoining berths. It 
was a very friendly talk, for they now felt that 
they were bound together still more closely by 
this new experience. It was a source of deep 
satisfaction to Percy that he had been off on a 
lonely ice-field with Joe Waters, that the two 
had been lost together, that the same cross had 
guided them, and in the meeting with Nat 
Perry and the subsequent return to the ship, 
not only Joe Waters but Percy James also had 
a part. 

It was delightful that there should be this 
similarity of experience. As they talked to- 
gether there in that sheltered retreat, the two 
boys hunted up all the possible things in their 
lives, or the lives of their kindred that might 
be coincidences, and emphasized them. They 
were talking finally about their sisters. 

I have got the nicest sister in the world, 
Percy, I tell ye,” said Joe. 


100 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


It is not surprising if the tone of this asser- 
tion was rather boastful. 

“ I don’t believe she is better than mine,” 
said Percy. 

His tone also was rather boastful. 

“ How old is yours, Joe ? ” 

“ She is a year and a half older than I am. 
She and Nat Perry are very good friends.” 

“ Oh ! ” replied Percy in a disappointed tone. 
He had not known about this interest of Nat 
Perry in Joe Waters’ sister. 

“ How old is yours, Percy ? ” 

“We are twins, and they say she looks like 
me.” 

“Does she? I’d like to see her,” said Joe, 
eagerly. 

“ She hasn’t any very good friend like Nat 
Perry, Joe,” replied Percy, with the air of one 
giving good for evil. 

“ Hasn’t she ? Then — then — perhaps I had 
better call round on my way home. That is 
the plan, you know. The Ann Batten goes 
to St. John’s, and my home is near there. 
Don’t you know I spoke about it? You 
forget.” 

“No, but I was thinking of something else 
when I spoke. What is your sister’s name ? ” 

“ My sister’s name is Angel, or that isn’t her 


LOST IN THE ICE-FIELD. 


lOI 


whole name. It is Angelina, and we shorten 
it to Angel.” 

“ That is funny, if your sister is called Angel, 
for mine we call Seraph.” 

** Angel and Seraph ! Then each one of us 
is brother to — to ” 

“An Angel!” 

That tickled the fancy of the boys, and they 
laughed heartily. 

“ How did your sister get the name Seraph, 
Percy?” 

“ That was my aunt’s doing. Mother told 
Aunt Polly she might name the baby. Some 
folks called Aunt Polly flighty, for she loved 
music and was a great singer. She had an in- 
strument called a seraphina, and she dearly 
loved it. When she had the naming of the 
baby, she said she was going to name it just 
what she wanted. So when in church at the 
christening, she said the name of the baby was 
Seraphina, it made the minister and everybody 
else stare. They all said though, it was just like 
‘Aunt Polly’ to pick out that name, and out- 
side they soon stopped talking about it. But at 
home, I don’t think they liked the name one bit, 
and mother said one day, ‘ There, let’s call the 
baby, Seraph ! Yes, we will! She is a dear 
little Seraph ! * So they all called her that way, 


102 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


and they liked it very much. She is just the best 
girl in the world, Joe.” 

** Excepting that other and my Angel.” 

The two boys had a pleasant discussion 
about the merits of their respective sisters, and 
then there were pauses, and talk was more and 
more scanty like a stream dwindling in summer- 
time, till at last, the brook having all run away, 
there was silence in the boys’ berths. Joe's 
drowsy thoughts were on the adventure of the 
day. Again, he was on the ice-field. Again, 
he was looking up to the cross he had built on 
the hummock. 

But what did he hear? 

He listened intently. 

“ Percy speaking ? ” he wondered. 

He leaned over the edge of his berth and 
listened. At the same time, he looked down 
into the bunk below. 

“ Fast asleep ! ” he said. ‘‘ What a handsome 
boy Percy is ! But he don’t look just well and 
strong. Hark, he is saying something ! ” 

There’s — the — cross ! ” murmured Percy. 
“ Can’t get lost ! ” 

Oh ! ” said Joe. “ He is dreaming about our 
time on the ice.” 

Falling back in his bunk, Joe’s thoughts 
sleepily wandered out upon the ice-field where 


LOST ON THE ICE-FIELD. 103 

the snow was falling, and soon sleep like a big 
descent of soft winter-flakes came down upon 
and smothered him. Just the sound of the 
breathing of the two tired boys could be heard 
there in that little retreat. Outside, the snow 
continued to fall faster and thicker. The wind 
had now risen and roared through the rigging. 
The watch on deck moved about in robes of 
white, on a floor of white, amid a great world 
of white. It not only was white but lonely 
and dreary and dead ; it was the loneliness, 
the dreariness, the death of the Arctic world. 


CHAPTER IX. 

WHAT BECAME OF HIM. 

T DON’T understand it,” declared Capt. 

X Grimes. “ Percy has got a bad fever- 
turn and I don’t know how he took cold, Joe, un- 
less he got it when you two were off on the ice.” 

“ I am afraid that is where he got it. He 
seemed at the time to be getting along well 
enough and did not speak as if he had taken 
cold when he got home, but there it is, a bad 
fever-turn as you say, and I don’t know where 
else he could have got it,” replied Joe. 

It was not only a bad fever-turn but it be- 
came worse. Joe was detailed as nurse. Capt. 
Grimes had a very limited knowledge of medi- 
cine and a scanty supply of remedies, but en- 
deavored to act as doctor. Percy was delirious 
the most of the time. When he came out of 
his delirium and Doctor or Captain Grimes pro- 
nounced the fever as ‘‘ turned,” Percy was left 
in a very weak state. 

“ Sort of strange ! ” thought Joe. “ He has 


WHAT BECAME OF HIM. 10$ 

been struggling like one trying to get up to the 
top of a high hill, working so hard in his fever, 
and now it seems as if he had fallen to the 
bottom of the hill, and lies there as weak 
almost as if he had no life left in him. But the 
doctor — I mean cap’n — says he has hopes.’* 

One day, Percy opened his eyes like a person 
coming back to life and he said feebly, Joe ! ” 

“ What is it, Percy?” 

“ Have I been sick long? ” 

“ Quite a number of days.” 

“ I don’t seem to remember anything about 
it.” 

“No, I suppose not.” 

“ Joe, is my face pale ? ” 

“ Pretty pale.” 

“And thin?” 

“ Pretty thin.” 

There was a little period of silence now. 

“ But, Percy, I don’t mean that you shall 
be pale and thin very long. I expect you will 
have an awful appetite under my nursing and 
come up tough as a whale when it wants to 
blow.” 

Percy smiled. 

Another period of silence. 

“ I don’t know about getting up from this, 
Joe. I am awful weak.” 


io6 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


'‘Of course you are, but you have a very 
fine doctor, and your nurse is the best in the 
world.” 

Percy smiled again. 

“ Joe, will you please go to my chest? ” 

“ Certainly, certainly ! That is what we are 
in this world for, to do favors and get things. 
What is in the chest you want ? ” 

“ My Bible.” 

“ All right ! you shall have it. Anything 
else?” 

“ In a little white box, is a gold anchor pin. 
You bring that too.” 

Joe found the Book and the box. 

“ You — you got your sister’s picture here ?” 

“ Yes, in another white box.” 

“ May I see it ? ” 

“ Oh yes ! ” 

Joe brought the three treasures to Percy’s 
bunk, the picture, the anchor, the Book. 

“ She look anything like me ? ” asked Percy, 
holding up the picture. 

That face of a girl in the bloom of health, 
however much it looked like the sailor-boy 
when well, was very much unlike the pinched, 
thin face now on the pillow. 

Joe avoided a direct answer to Percy’s 
question. 


WHAT BECAME OF HIM. 10/ 

“ Her eyes are ever so much like yours, 
Percy, large and full.” 

Seraph has beautiful eyes.” 

“ And the complexion,” continued Joe, look- 
ing from the picture to Percy’s face, as if 
making the fairest, fullest comparison of one 
with the other, “and the mouth and ” 

“ Oh, nonsense, Joe ! Why don’t you say, 
* Old boy, you have been sick and you look 
about as much like that picture as — as ’ ” 

“ As much like it as one can under the — 
the circumstances.” 

“That is it! That will do! Now the Bible 
and the gold anchor were given me by my 
relative, Cap’n Hartwell, and I give them to 
you and ” 

“ Oh, no ! I thank you, but you will want 
your Bible ” 

** 1 have got another down at the bottom of 
my chest. That is where Bibles are apt to go, 
but what I give you, I had near the top and I 
did read it before I was sick.” 

“ Oh, you are going to get well, and you 
will need them, the Bible and the anchor 
pin.” 

“ I doubt about getting well, and anyway I 
want you to take these — you must ! Put that 
pin on now, in your bosom, and let me see 


io8 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


how it will look ! Very well indeed, it looks ! 
Now you keep it ! ” 

“ Well, if you get well, I shall return them.” 
*‘No, I can’t leave it that way. If I want 
them, I will tell you. If I don’t, you are to 
keep them always. I want you to have some- 
thing to remember this sickness by. It is all 
settled now. I don’t want to hear anything 
more about it. Now, I want you to find 
something in the New Testament about the 
cross. I see that cross on the hummock all the 
time. Read something about that, please ! ” 

“ I — I — don’t know what,” replied Joe, who 
read his Bible very spasmodically and very 
scantily now-a-days. 

In the third chapter of Saint John, there is 
a verse, ‘ And as Moses lifted up ’ — though, 
there isn’t anything about the cross in it — but 
you read that and the rest of it.” 

Joe had a clear, ringing voice, and at home 
had been called one of the best readers in the 
district. He now began; “And as Moses 
lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so 
must the son of man be lifted up : That who- 
soever believeth in Him should not perish but 
have eternal life.” 

“ Won’t you read on, Joe ? ” 

He read half a dozen verses. 


WHAT BECAME OF HIM. IO9 

“ Will you read those again ? I seem to see 
that cross on the hummock.” 

Joe read them again. 

“Thank you, Joe. You are a good reader. 
Seraph, she is a good reader.” 

“ I suppose she thinks a good deal of those 
things.” 

“ She is very religious.” 

“Awful, I suppose,” said Joe, who began to 
be afraid of this serious-minded Seraph. 

“ Oh, no ! Your Angel, she ” 

“ She is a good girl and wants me to read 
the Bible and all that, but I guess she is not so 
high up as Seraph.” 

“ I don’t know,” said Percy abstractedly, 
“ but — I do know this one thing! ” 

His voice strengthened. A light came into 
his face as he spoke : “ I know she is praying 
for me. She does that, every day.” 

He did not say anything more. He lay with 
his ^eyes closed, his thin, white face in peace. 
Soon his breathing was easy, soft and regular. 

When he woke up, he exclaimed, “ Oh, Joe, 
I had a glorious dream. You know my mind 
has been running on that cross you built on 
the hummock. Well, I saw it in my dream. 
How distinct it was I I can see it now ! But 
that wasn't all. As I looked at the cross, it 


no 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


seemed to change. It turned into a door, a 
gate, and this was set in a beautiful wall. It 
was not a common wall but flashed with the 
light of beautiful stones. It made me think of 
the last book in the Bible where it speaks of 
the wall that had the beautiful foundations, the 
twelve precious stones, you know. Well, some- 
thing said to me, ‘ Now, that the cross is the 
gate in the wall, you won’t have any trouble 
about getting in.’ And I didn’t have the least. 
Somehow, I heard my mother’s voice — she is 
dead, you know ! When she was young, they 
say she looked just like Seraph. My mother’s 
voice was saying to me, ‘ You will have not 
the least trouble about going in, and don’t you 
hear the music ? Come ! ’ Oh, what music ! 
All coming out of this gate ! I could see a lit- 
tle way in too. I could see a street of gold 
coming down to the gate. Beautiful ! Well, 
suddenly, I awoke ! I was still outside of the 
gate ! ” 

Percy’s voice had in it a tone of disappoint- 
ment, but Joe cheered him up. 

Oh, don’t you worry, Percy ! Guess you 
will go in all right. You have been talking a 
good deal, and you are tired. You had better 
go to sleep and have a nap.” 

Well ! ” replied Percy. His tone of voice 


WHAT BECAME OF HIM. 


Ill 


was that of disappointment. In a moment, he 
spoke again. This time, his tone was cheerful ; 
‘‘ Perhaps it may come back again, if I go to 
sleep.” 

In a few moments, Joe bent down over him, 
and listening to his breathing, nodded his head 
and said, 

He is asleep, and it may have come back.” 

Capt. Grimes here appeared and said, “ Come 
Joe ! Go out and get the air, or go somewher 
and change your thoughts. I will stay with 
Percy.” 

Joe stepped out on deck, but the air was sc 
very cold and sharp, he did not stay long. He 
went as far as the bows and looked off. The 
Ann Batten was under a big spread of canvas. 
Behind it was the north wind. There was 
much muscle to it. Blowing steadily, pressing 
ceaselessly, it drove the Ann Batten forward 
at a rapid rate. 

‘‘Going toward home!** soliloquized Joe. 
“That is good! Clear of the ice and going 
down the Greenland coast with a spanking 
breeze ! Having looked round all I care, 
guess I will go in and see Pompey.** 

Pompey was not the only one in his galley, 
for Washington, the beloved son of the cook, 
kept him company. 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


1 12 

** Come in out ob de cole, come in, honey ! ** 
was Pompey’s welcome. 

“ Thanks ! ” said Joe. “ What is the news ? ” 
Oh nuffin ! De George Augustus been 
a-keepin’ cumpny wid us all day.” 

“ That so ? Capt. Hartwell going to St. 
John’s when we are through up here ? ” 

“ Dunno. Heard suffin ’bout hisgoin’ ’cross 
de water to Dunkirk. But what is de news 
from de hospittle ? ” 

Pompey having rattled his stove-covers and 
dampers, packing in coal and opening all the 
draughts on account of Joe, now lolled back on 
a bench set against a galley-wall, and waited for 
Joe’s answer. 

Joe then told the story of Percy’s dream of 
the cross that became a gate. 

“ Shuah ! I see ! I see ! Booful meanin’ ! 
De cross am de way to glory I No doubt ’bout 
dat ! But ” 

Here Pompey shook his head. 

“ Dat chile won’ get well ! ” 

“Won’t? Why not? He seems to be im- 
proving.” 

“ When you dream dat way,” replied Pom- 
pey, his eyes rolling round and showing all the 
whites they ever had or could have, “ dey don’ 
git well. Dat nebber fail I See here ! ” 


WHAT BECAME OF HIM. II3 

Pompey now dropped his voice as if to make 
a very valuable communication under the 
pledge of secrecy. 

Washington who had as much love of the 
marvellous as his father, leaned forward to 
catch every precious word that might fall from 
the paternal lips. 

All dreamin’ 'bout der Jurdan " 

“ The what?" asked Joe. “ Oh, I see, the 
Jordan ! " 

De ribber what folks crosses when dey’se 
gwine hum. My fader afore he died, he 
dreamed 'bout der Jurdan, an’ " 

“ What kind of a dream ? " asked Joe. 

*‘Oh, dey come to a ribber, a black, deep 
ribber, an* de glory a shinin’ on de udder side 

“ But what Percy saw was a door, a gate 
opening into a wall.” 

** Same ting, jes’ a trifle diffunt in de spres- 
sion. Now, you mark my words, when de sick 
see dem tings, a ribber, a mountin, a light, it 
am a sign dat nebber fail. Dey’se gwine 
hum ! ” 

“ I don’t like to think Percy is so low as 
that,’’ said Joe, very mournfully. 

A worl’ ob trouble, a worl’ ob trouble ! 
Hark ! ’’ 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


1 14 

Here the old cook arose, pushed back the 
sliding door of his galley and looked out. 

“ Jes’ de win* a-barkin* roun’ ! ” 

His tone seemed to indicate that it would 
have been a relief to have discovered something 
serious, a catastrophe above or below. 

When Pompey had taken his seat again, 
Joe said to him, 

“ Did you ever see a funeral at sea, Pom. 
pey?” 

“ Oh, hunderd ob *em ! 

“ Poor Percy! ” 

** Berry ’pressib. De cap’n read de burial 
service — de men stan* all roun’ mournfu’ like 
— an* de body am committed to de deep, de 
great deep ! ’* 

Nothing was said after that. The galley 
became very close and oppressive. It seemed 
to Joe as if the place were hot and confined 
like a furnace and it would stifle him. He 
rose, opened the door and stepped out. Pom- 
pey gently closed the door after him, and then 
appealed to his son ; 

“ Don* ye see, Wash*n*t*n, don* yer see, how 
dat trouble him ? ** 

Washington nodded his head. 

“ Can*t be helped,” continued Pompey. “All 
mus* go ober Jurdan when dere turn come. 


WHAT BECAME OF HIM. 11$ 

De chillun ob Isr’el dey pass ober Jurdan, an’ 
so we all, all mus’ go ober Jurdan, an’ dat boy 
Percy he am a-goin’ shuah ! ” 

So every one thought. In the forecastle, 
in the cabin, out on the deck, up on the yards 
where any of the crew might be furling sail, 
all over the ship, that was the opinion of officers 
and crew ; Percy was going to die. His funeral 
was anticipated confidently while sadly. In the 
shadow of this expectation, the sailors did their 
work. That shadow reached down into the 
forecastle, sombre enough any time. 

Come, come, boys ! ” some old sailor might 
say to his younger mates cracking their jokes. 
** Take a reef in your talk ! No time when a 
ship-mate is dyin’ to be spinnin’ sich yarns.” 

And yet Percy did not die. There was no 
crossing over the shadowy Jordan. There was 
no funeral. There was no gliding of a poor 
human body into the great, silent, mysterious 
ocean, as the solemn words were spoken, 
“ We therefore commit his body to the deep. ” 
Percy recovered. When Joe returned to his 
watch by Percy’s berth, the captain said, 
“ He is better, Joe ! ” He steadily, rapidly grew 
better. 

‘‘ He is coming up wonderfully,” asserted the 
captain, as if the poor wasted body had gone 


Il6 A SALT WATER HERO. 

down into the vast deep and then had risen 
again and now stood forth in the old strength. 

** Wonderful ! ” everybody said. 

Mir-ercle, mirercle ! ” declared Pompey. 
“ Fought shuah he were a-goin’ ober Jurdan.” 

Something sad did happen though, and if 
Percy had really died, Joe did not know as he 
could have felt worse. 

That other whaler, the George Augustus, 
had kept the Ann Batten company after their 
release from their icy prison. The hunt for 
whales nominally was over, but the ships as 
they turned and left the old fishing-grounds, 
compelled by the lateness of the season, made 
it a practise to heed every cry, “ There she 
blows ! " and capture another whale if possible. 
The run down through the Greenland waters 
was therefore slow and protracted, but still 
homeward. All this time Percy steadily gained, 
as if he were another vessel making progress 
toward the land of milder weather and better 
health. 

One day, the George Augustus ran down 
toward the Ann Batten and courteously saluting 
this storm-beaten female, lay to and lowered a 
boat. This small craft brought over to the 
Ann Batten Capt. Hartwell, who after a short 
talk with Capt. Grimes, went to interview 


WHAT BECAME OF HIM. 


II7 


Percy James. The boy had so far convalcesed 
that on pleasant days he would walk out upon 
the deck. At the present time, he had retired 
to his berth and was sleeping. He was aroused 
when Capt. Hartwell announced a wish to see 
Percy. 

“ Oh dear ! ” thought Percy afterward. 
“ Why didn’t somebody tell him I couldn’t be 
waked up ? If I could have slept through his 
stay and not have seen him ! ” 

Percy did see him though, and as a result of 
the call Percy told Joe Waters he was going at 
once, ** chest and all,” to the George Augustus ! 

What, — for — good — Percy ? ” asked the as- 
tonished Joe, his eyes staring, his breath failing 
him. 

Yes, for good, chest and all, Joe ! ” 

Say it again and say it slowly ! You take 
my breath away.” 

“ My dear Joe, it is an awful shame, but for 
good, chest and all, I am going to the George 
Augustus, soon as I can get my things in the 
boat. I have — got — to — go Oh dear!” 

** When-en-en-en ? ” said Joe. 

The tears were in Percy’s brilliant eyes. 

** I — I — am a girl about it, Joe.” 

‘‘ Well, I’m mad ! What does it all mean ? 
How can that old poke, pirate Hartwell, dispose 
of you at that rate ? ” 


Il8 A SALT WATER HERO. 

‘‘He takes care of me. ” 

“ What we call in the States, a guardian I 
suppose ? ” 

“ Perhaps so. My parents are dead. I don’t 
live with him, but he looks after me. He said 
I might come here, and it seems he told Cap’n 
Grimes it might be for a short time, so he is 
under no obligation to let me stay, and — and — 
I must go. ” 

Percy’s eyes were again filling to the brim 
with tears. 

“ But go where, Percy ? ” 

“ I think we are going to Dunkirk, — that is 
in Scotland and a whaling port — and I believe 
then we come home, and Cap’n Hartwell says I 
can see you in St. John’s if you stay long enough 
_but ” 

“ Is all ready? ” called Capt. Hartwell in sharp, 
rasping tones from the rail of the Ann Batten. 

“ Almost, sir ! ” shouted Percy. In a low 
tone, he said, “Quick, Joe ! Put down on this 
paper just where you live in the States! I’ll 
get there, see if I don’t. Here’s a lead pencil ! ” 

Joe was scribbling hurriedly while Percy was 
protesting his undying friendship, but in the 
midst of the sentence, “ I never saw a boy 
I liked so well — ” a barbarous voice bawled, 
“ Come, come ! I can’t wait ! ” 


WHAT BECAME OF HIM. 


II9 

They were still in the boys’ house. 

“ Good-bye, Joe ! ” said Percy. 

“ Let me kiss you, Percy ! ” 

It was the first time Joe had ever kissed a 
boy excepting his brother Sammy, but he now 
kissed Percy tenderly as if it had been his 
sweetheart. 

Tears too were in Joe’s eyes as he said, 
** Good-bye,” and in a husky voice added, “ I’ll 
— say — good-bye — here, for if I went out where 
Cap’n Hartwell is, I might kill him for taking 
you.” 

Oh no ! Good-bye, Joe ! I’ll never forget 
you, and if you are in St. John’s long enough, 
you hunt up Seraph and my grandmother.” 

From the door of the boys’ house, Joe 
watched the George Augustus’ boat as it tossed 
on the uneasy sea, headed for the whaler that 
soon would be heading for Europe. 

He watched Capt. Hartwell. 

I hate him ! ” he muttered. 

He saw Percy James. 

“ I like him better than any boy of my age I 
ever saw. I — love him ! ” 

Joe watched the boat as it halted under the 
starboard rail of the George Augustus. He 
saw Percy climb the little rope-ladder swung 
over the vessel’s side. Then as the George 


120 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Augustus’ bow was pointed Europeward and 
her canvas swelled and filled, Joe caught the 
flutter of a little thing of white above the ves- 
sel’s rail. 

“That is Percy waving his handkerchief,” 
thought Joe. “Yes, I see his face. He must 
see me ! One more chance to say good-bye.” 

Out came Joe’s handkerchief in his impulsive, 
enthusiastic way, and it fluttered in the air 
excitedly. He watched the handkerchief of 
Percy long as it waved, and he kept waving his 
own in response. 

“ That Cap’n Hartwell — I am going to call 
him not a guardian but Percy’s jailer — and I 
know the jailer stopped Percy’s handkerchief,” 
thought Joe. 

He continued to look toward the George 
Augustus. It dwindled, dwindled, became a 
misty pillar of white, a vanishing iceberg in 
the east. The iceberg sank lower as if it had 
met with a warm rain and were melting. It 
finally melted all away into the sea. 

When Joe turned about and entered the boys* 
house, he seemed to hear a solemn, mournful 
voice saying, “ We therefore commit his body 
to the deep.” 

If he had actually heard the voice and really 
seen the canvas-folded body disappearing in 


WHAT BECAME OF HIM. 


121 


the vast deep, he could not have felt 
worse. 

“ However I’ve got his Bible ! ” thought Joe. 
‘‘ That is one comfort. The jailer can’t take 
that away. I’ll read out of it to-night.” 

He read it, that night and subsequent nights. 
He was rather disturbed when he noticed the 
jailer’s name upon the fly-leaf, as if fearful that 
this stern officer might snatch it away from 
Joe. He remembered though that Percy had 
said that Capt. Hartwell gave him the book, 
and “ so he had a right to let me have it,” 
thought Joe. ‘‘And I’ll turn over a new leaf 
— Angel would like it and Seraph I guess, too, 
— and I will read it.” 

The first night after Percy’s departure, or 
abduction Joe considered it, Joe had a beauti- 
ful dream. He saw a fair white cross that 
turned into a golden door. Percy was walking 
toward it and beckoned to Joe. 


CHAPTER X. 


A FLUTTER IN THE WATERS’-HOME. 

T here was a flutter in the kitchen of the 
Waters-family in Shipton, and it was 
destined to be a worse one before it was over. 

It was a bright autumn morning when the 
maples were trying to get up more lively colors 
than the sun ever manufactured at sunrise or 
sunset. The great ambition in the Waters’- 
kitchen, however, was to get up a dinner. 

** Angel, what shall we have for dinner ? ’* 
asked Mrs. Waters, “ I believe there is nothing 
in the house.” 

Her tone was that of despair, and she went 
on to remark sharply, 

** If I only knew where your father was, I 
might send him to the fish store. He started 
out, I believe, to attend a meeting to promote 
the fishing interests of Shipton. I wish he’d 
promote ours ! ” 

Angel laughed, giving one of her low, 
silvery little chuckles, and then raised a face 


A FLUTTER IN THE WATERS’-HOME. I23 

SO full of the sweetness of hope and the bright- 
ness of summer that even sombre Mrs. Waters 
was obliged to laugh and look merry and for- 
get for the moment all about that grave problem, 
what may a family with enterprising appetites 
have for dinner. Soon, Mrs. Waters was ready 
to break out into a second lamentation. 

“ Now, mother ! you hold on ! Let me go 
out into the shed and look on that line where 
father sometimes hangs his salt fish or dried 
halibut.’’ 

“No use, Angel ! I went out yesterday and 
I saw for myself. I could not but think of 
poor Joe the day before he went away among 
the awful icebergs and those greedy whales 
with their big, slobbering mouths. You know 
Joe went out to look at that line.” 

“ I know it, mother, I know it, but you let 
me go.” 

“ Oh, Angel, you are the greatest girl to 
hope ! ” 

Out she ran to leave a dark kitchen behind 
her but to brighten with her beautiful smile of 
hope the gloomy little shed. She climbed the 
short stairway to the second story, thinking of 
Joe among the big-mouthed whales (giving one 
thought to Nat Perry also), and then her 
thoughts came home to wish that her father, 


124 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Sidney Waters, were not less interested in such 
public matters as the promoting of Shipton’s 
fishing enterprises, but more successful in get- 
ting food for a family whose mouths were not 
as big as those of the whales, but whose 
appetites were as unfailing. 

She lifted her eyes to the string from which 
Mr. Waters was accustomed to suspend his 
finny possessions, and if she had seen a whale 
dangling there, she could not have been more 
surprised than she was now, for lo, from the fish- 
string hung a long, fine strip of dried halibut ! 

“ Father got that since mother came out 
here! Dear father, forgive us all! You are 
not so forgetful after all ! ” exclaimed Angel. 
“ Well, I am surprised ! Now we will have a 
bouncing dinner.” 

She had hardly said this when she chanced 
to look out of the window that lighted this 
dingy, dusty, little retreat. Here it was that 
the paternal head of the Waters-family liked 
to sit and look out and dreamily watch the 
dock beyond and then the river strong and 
tireless with its two tides a day like mails 
made up for the sea, taking, as the down cur- 
rent strengthened, such packages of value as 
coasting schooners, and fishing smacks, big 
sand-scows, sometimes a ship. 


A FLUTTER IN THE WATERS’- HO ME. 12$ 

The dock generally had two or three vessels 
in it, but no such attractions were there now. 
Indeed nothing was there but mud, dock-mud, 
thick, black, oozing, and deep. And strug- 
gling through this mud, frantically wriggling, 
flourishing his hands in despair, what was it, a 
young whale, walrus, polar bear, or what ? 

“ If that isn’t our Sammy ! Such a pict- 
ure!” exclaimed Angel. 

She raised the web-curtained window and 
was she about to say, “ What under heavens, 
Samuel Waters, are you up to ” ? 

That was not Angel’s style. She was pre- 
pared to cry out sympathetically, “ Poor 
Sammy ! ” and take sunshine to a boy’s clouded 
heart, but he anticipated her. Hearing the 
noise of the rising window, he ceased wriggling 
in the mud, and looking up, screamed, 

‘^Oh Angel, help!” 

“ Too bad ! Sister is coming ! ” she shrieked. 

“And I got a letter from Joe ! ” 

He held up something white. 

A letter from Joe! From the North Pole! 
Perhaps a line from Nat Perry ! Angel’s breath 
was almost leaving her. At the same time, 
there was the ludicrousness of Sammy’s situ- 
ation. Two very strong emotions cannot exist 
distinct and separate at the same time in the 


126 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


human soul. Angel’s began to mix. Then as 
they would not combine more than oil and 
water, they began to part company. The more 
imperative subject at the present moment, 
Sammy’s situation, began to crowd upon her 
attention. She giggled. 

'‘Always into something ! Might be as well 
dock-mud first as last ! ” she murmured. “ Just 
like Sammy ! Poor boy ! ” 

Laughing away, she summoned her mother 
and Kitty, who were in the kitchen. 

"Oh, mother, come quick! Joe is in the 
dock and there is a letter from the North Pole ! ” 

" What ! ” shrieked her mother, springing up 
from her chair. 

Angel though had gone. 

Mrs. Waters heard a heavy step in the sitting- 
room and knew that her husband had come. 
She ran to him, 

" Oh father ! I expect the Ann Batten has 
arrived, for Joe is in the dock, Angel says, and 
she has got a mail from the — somewhere — and 
has got the North Pole — out in the dock.” 

She then turned about, dazed and wondering, 
while exultant, and rushed the other way, tow- 
ard the back door which opened into a lane 
leading to the dock. She did not stop to grab 
shawl, hat, or anything. Swift-footed Kitty 


A FLUTTER IN THE WATERS’-HOME. I2y 

had preceded her and was already flying down 
the lane. 

“ What?” said the bewildered father. 

“ Angel has got a mail from the dock up at 
the North Pole and the Ann Batten has arrived 
with Joe ” 

“ Why, I just came from a wharf and no 
whaler ” 

He raised no more points of doubt and in- 
quiry, but in a tumult of emotion saying, 

“ Joe must have come anyway and brought. 

a — a — a ” He too rushed into the lane, 

firmly persuaded that Joe had reached the rear 
of the premises. The Ann Batten might not 
have arrived, but that Joe had come by cars, by 
dory, by balloon, somehow, Sidney Waters was 
fully convinced. When he had nigh brought 
on an old heart-trouble by a swift, tumultuous 
passage down the lane, looking up, he saw his 
excited wife and Kitty at the edge of the dock, 
and there in the dock itself, was the old whaler, 
the Ann Batten ? No, sunk to his knees, stuck 
in its soft, black mud, there was Sammy 
Waters, holding up a letter, and calling out, 
“ Somebody help me ! ” 

At the same time, the father heard a voice 
behind him saying. 

Please, father, lend a hand ! ” 


128 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Turning round, he saw the fair and beloved 
Angel toiling forward, her arms filled with short 
pieces of board. Not very many, for the 
Waters-axe was quite likely to dispatch for 
fuel anything of the kind that might accu- 
mulate. These pieces Angel had taken from 
the yard where they had been laid as a walk. 

** Why, Angel, dear ! What — let me take 
them — where is the Ann Batten — and where is 
Joe — and the North Pole and 

‘‘ What, father?” 

Then Angel, who was as sensitive to the 
ludicrous as a thermometer to heat and cold, 
began to laugh. 

“ Why, no ! It is Sammy who has been to 
the post-office and brought a letter from Joe 
and took a short cut home instead of coming 
round the dock — ha, ha, ha ! ” 

“ Oh dear ! Bless us ! I thought it was Joe 1 
There, I’ll have those boards laid down in a 
jiffy.” 

“Thought you said it was Joe out in the 
dock, Angel.” 

This querulous voice belonged to Mrs. 
Waters. 

“ Why, no, mother ! ” 

“ I thought the Ann Batten had got in and 
I told your father ” 


A FLUTTER IN THE VVATERS*-HOME. 1 29 

“ / said so ? Why, no ! ” 

Yes, you did ! ” exclaimed Kitty. I 
heard you. You were thinking of Nat Perry.” 

‘‘ I did ? Then — oh, forgive me, forgive me ! ” 

And Angel blushed like a swamp maple in 
October and laughed again. Mrs. Waters tried 
to laugh, but was not quite equal to it. The 
father would have laughed, but he was just 
now grunting over an effort to throw the 
boards down into the dock and land them so 
that Sammy could step on them. One board 
came very near this mail-carrier’s head. 

** Don’t hit me, father! ” besought Sammy, 
plaintively. 

** No, Sidney, don’t knock the child over ! ” 
said his nervous wife. ** He has only one life 
to live.” 

“ I — won’t — hit — him, madame ! ” replied the 
offended husband with dignity, speaking slowly 
and feeling a recurrence of his old heart-trouble. 
“If — I only — had a boat!” he said, ab- 
stractedly. 

“ Or the Ann Batten ! ” said the giggling 
Angel, unable to restrain her risible muscles, 
accompanied, too, in these emotions by Kitty, 
who could appreciate a joke. 

“ I don’t see what there is to laugh at,” de- 
clared the mother gloomily gazing at Sammy. 


tjo A SALT WATER HERO. 

** The boy is in the mud ! ” 

At this, the father smiled, and looking at a 
cloud whose contour was very human-like, 
actually winked at the cloud. But that dis- 
loyal smile, that careless wink, that heedless 
turn of the body, Sidney Waters speedily 
atoned for. A short board was in each hand, 
and as he turned toward Sammy again, he 
lost his balance, and down into the dock he 
went, like a big, luckless goose with outspread 
wings ! 

Such a commotion as there was then, Mr. 
Waters floundering, sputtering and groaning, 
Mrs. Waters wringing her hands and screaming, 
“ Man overboard ! Help ! Help ! ” Kitty 
joining in the maternal shrieking, Angel look- 
ing down helplessly, conscience-smitten, a look 
of awe having taken the place of all fun. 

“ Oh, he will smother in the mud ! Help ! 
Help ! ” now bawled Mrs. Waters. 

Sammy was the only one who did anything. 
A baby in the presence of his own disaster, he 
now manfully waded through the sticky ooze, 
crying, 

‘‘ Oh, father, let me help you up ! " 

The father was up speedily, spitting the mud 
out of his mouth and wiping it from his 
eyes. 


A FLUTTER IN THE WATERS’-HOME. I3I 

** If this isn’t a mess, and a nasty one, 
Sammy! I always did despise this dock!” 
growled the father. 

“ Take my handkerchief, poor father ! Wipe 
your eyes out ! ” urged Sammy. 

“ Poor father ! Poor Sammy ! Too bad ! ” 
were some of the words of commiseration show- 
ered down by the family. 

“ A burning shame ! ” said Mrs. Waters. 

“ A pretty wet one, I think,” said her hus- 
band. 

That started a laugh and eased the strain of 
the present embarrassment. 

Mr. Waters now lifted to the top of the wharf 
the only son and heir that at the present time 
he had in Shipton, and then scrambled up him- 
self. 

** Where is that mail from the North Pole ? ” 
he asked at once. 

“Here, father! A letter from Joe,” said 
Sammy, trudging off with his mother. “ I’ll 
take care of it.” 

“ Now, poor father, and Sammy, poor boy, 
come right home, and we will make you com- 
fortable,” said the sympathetic Angel, several 
small twinkles still hiding in her soft, bright 
eyes like flashes of sunlight in the dewy corners 
of the fields. 


13 ^ 


A SALT Water hero. 


Such a mess ! ” said the disgusted parent, 
looking down at his dirty trousers. 

He caught the twinkles in Angel’s eyes. 

Here, Angel ! Come one side a moment, 
here, round this corner of this pile of boards ! 
There, dear ! Here we are ! Nobody can see 
us ! Now — let us laugh ! ” 

“ Poor father ! ” said Angel, the tears running 
down her cheeks as she laughed. 

‘‘ And poor Sammy ! ” said her father, shak- 
ing his sides, as he roared away behind the pile 
of boards. 

“ Hark ! ” said Mrs. Waters, who had gone 
ahead. ‘‘What is that noise, Sammy, like 
people laughing? ” 

“ Sailors, I guess, mother.” 

“ No, coal-heavers ! I saw some of them.” 

She had not given the right name to one of 
the objects involved in the merry peals of 
laughter echoing above that pile of boards, but 
the clothes of a coal-heaver on his blackest, 
day could not have looked worse than Sidney 
Waters. 

Angel and her father soon resumed their 
walk home. 

“You got that letter, Angel ? ” 

“ No, father, Sammy has.” 

“ Well, let’s get it and have it read the first 
thing.” 


A FLUTTER IN THE WATERS*-HOME. I33 

But hadn’t you better make yourself com- 
fortable first?” 

“ A letter from our Joe away up at the North 
Pole, Angel, and his father waiting until he 
is comfortable before he reads it ! No sir! I 
mean, no ma’am ! ” 

‘‘ But mother’s clean kitchen, father dear ! ” 

“Come out into the shed-chamber! No 
harm there. Get the letter at once, Angel! 
Bring the rest of the family ! ” 

The devoted parent could not be induced to 
change his mind. Before he divested himself 
of his load of dock-mud, he insisted that the 
letter should be read. 

“ To think of it ! ” he said to his family, who 
quickly gathered about him in the shed-cham- 
ber, Sammy’s mother having expeditiously 
clapped the boy into a pair of clean breeches. 
“ To think of it ! I could not have faced my 
dear Joe again if I had not listened to his 
letter the very first thing, not if a whole dock 
were on top of me ! ” 

Angel’s eyes began to twinkle as if she 
thought a good portion of the dock-mud were 
on her father now. Nothing was said though. 
Mrs. Waters took out her spectacles, and slipped 
them as if a bridle over her nose, that prom- 
inent if not unruly member, and then she 


134 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Opened the letter. Sammy and Kitty occupied 
with their mother a long box. Angel was 
seated in a chair that had lost its backbone and 
been sent to this hospital for furniture-cripples. 
The father had turned upside-down a mack- 
erel-kit, and planting himself on it turned his 
mud-spattered face toward that window from 
which oftentimes he had so dreamily con- 
templated the future, painting many a picture 
of coming greatness for himself or family. He 
was only a mud-turtle now, squat on the mack- 
erel-kit. The letter from the North Pole was 
promptly read. It had been written from the 
whaling grounds and sent home by a whaling 
vessel that had an earlier spring start than the 
Ann Batten and consequently was leaving Arc- 
tic waters sooner. These were the letter items 
of special importance to us : 

“What do you think?*' said Joe. “ Capt. 
Grimes told me that Nat Perry was his smart- 
est seaman, and he means to promote Nat and 
give him a chance to do mate's duties before 
he gets to Newfoundland, one of our officers 
being just about sick. Then, the captain says, 
when he gets home, he means to speak to the 
firm running the Ann Batten and see if they 
haven't a ship where they can try Nat as first 
mate or even captain. Capt. Grimes says he 


A FLUTTER IN THE WATERS’-HOME. 1 35 

has all that confidence in him. Now how does 
that sound, Capt. Nathaniel Perry? ” 

Here the reading was interrupted that those 
present might comment on this bit of news. 
It was the place where the applause might 
come in. 

Well,” declared Mrs. Waters, raising her 
spectacles from her Roman nose, I always 
did think Nat was smart, and he is real good to 
his parents.” 

“Yes,” chimed in Sidney Waters, “and very 
intelligent. He stood at the head of his class 
in the High School. I heard him say when he 
went to sea that he knew a sailor’s life was 
tough, but he was bound to rise if hard work 
and fair play would do it.” 

“ Mrs. Capt. Perry ! ” said a voice behind 
AngePs chair. “ How does that sound ? ” 

“ Now, Sammy, if you don’t go away ! ” said 
the blushing Angel. “ Mrs. Capt. Perry is go- 
ing to be respected, sir ! You take a chair or 
that box, and behave.” 

“ Mrs. Capt. Perry ! ” Sidney Waters was 
saying to himself. “ Mrs. Capt. Perry’s father ! 
That sounds very well.” 

He was now indulging his mood for castle- 
building and saw measureless glory coming to 
the family through Nat’s good fortune, when 
his wife’s voice aroused him : 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


136 

** Come, father, don’t go to sleep ! I have 
got some more for ye ! ” 

All right, wife ! Hist your anchor and sail 
away ! ” 

** Joe says, ‘ I have made a fine acquaintance 
here, a boy by the name of Percy James. He 
is real generous. He has some kind of a 
relative who has given him things, and I have 
the hardest work to keep Percy from giving 
them all to me. I expect he will want to give 
me something I saw in his chest to-day, a real 
pretty Bible. It would be just like him. I 
may see his folks when I get to Newfoundland. 
That is where they live. And see here, Angel ! 
Can’t you get me a recommendation or several, 
from people of good standing, one or more, 
saying they know me, and will vouch for me 
and so on ? That is Capt. Grimes* suggestion. 
It is a part of the programme — and we were told 
at home it might be, and the crew told to take 
the risk, you remember — to go to St. John’s, 
Newfoundland, and sell the Ann Batten and 
her cargo. There is a party in St. John’s, I 
believe, waiting to buy us out. The captain 
says while we may get a chance to go home at 
once from St. John’s, we may need to wait. 
He says he thinks we all may get a chance to 
ship before the mast on board some vessel and 


A FLUTTER LN THE VVATERS’-HOME. 1 37 

the trip home in that way cost us nothing — if — 
we can just wait a while. In the meantime, 
he says, we can get a job at something. 
‘ What can I do ? * I asked him. ‘ Oh, I 
don’t know,’ said the captain, ‘ but something 
will turn up. You might get a few recom- 
mendations from some of the town’s-people, 
some of the leading citizens, you know, and it 
will help you about getting a chance to work, I 
doubt not.’ I thought it was a bit of good 
advice, and I knew Angel could get me the 
document, if anybody could. I hate to trouble 
any of you, but when you are down this way 
and want a job, I will do as much for you.” 

“ Good boy ! Don’t doubt it ! Good boy ! ” 
dreamily murmured Sidney Waters, his dock- 
marked face still turned toward the window. 

I knew the vessel might be sold at St. 
John’s, and so did the crew, but no one thought 
it really would be sold. However, Joe will be 
master of the situation.” 

Joe’s letter closed with a number of mes- 
sages to those at home and to his boy-friends, 
and then Mrs. Waters slipped from her nose 
its glassy bridle and said, All through ! ” 
“Yes, wife, Angel,” said Sidney Waters, 
“ those recommendations must be sent off. 
Let me see ! Who will give them ? Now 


38 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


there is the minister, and there is Squire 
French, the chairman of our board of select- 
men, he will write one.” 

“ Well, Sidney, don’t you think you had 
better clean up first? ” asked his wife, gazing 
wonderingly at the abstracted husband who 
still in his coat of mud sat meditatively con- 
templating the outside world through the win- 
dow. 

‘‘Hark!” said Angel. “I hear a noise. 
I’ll go down and see what it is.” 

She went down and came back holding up a 
warning hand. “ Dear me ! ” she said, in a low 
tone. “ If it isn’t Squire French himself down 
in the yard coming right this way, and the two 
other selectmen are poking along after him I ” 

“ Oh my ! Oh my ! ” exclaimed Sidney Wat- 
ers, jumping up from the mackerel-kit. “ I 
promised to go with them to inspect the con- 
ditions of the Town Hall.” 

As he was janitor of the hall, this accom- 
paniment by Squire French and his brethren 
in office, was very natural. 

“ Oh yes ! ” he now exclaimed. “ I promised 
to go with them, and they were to call for me.” 

“ Father, father, you will run into them if you 
go down now! They are almost up to the 
shed-door.” 


A FLUTTER IN THE WATERS’-HOME. 1 39 

“They are, Angel? I was going to skip 
into the house.’* 

“No, no!” 

“ But I — I must be on hand.” He looked 
half-distracted, running to the head of the 
stairs, only to be detained by Angel’s hands. 

“ But — but — ” He stopped and looked des- 
pairingly toward the window. “ See here, 
Angel ! I can drop from that window and cut 
round the corner of the dock into the lane and 
so into the house. They won’t see me.” 

He was now looking out of the window. 

“ Only ten feet down, Angel I ” 

“ Ten, father, but you go into the mud 
straight ! ” 

“ Can’t — can’t — be worse muddied.” 

“ Angel, Angel ! ” said a half-suppressed 
voice on the stairway. 

It was Sammy. 

“ What, Sammy ? ” 

“ Mr. Oliver, the town-clerk, is coming 
into the yard, Angel ! ” 

“ And — oh dear — heading for the shed- 
door?’’ 

“ Yes, nobody is in the house. Mother has 
run into a neighbor’s to tell the news from 
Joe.” 

“ Angel, I am going out of this window,” 


140 A SALT WATER HERO. 

said the father, decidedly. “ Mr. Oliver wants 
to see me.” 

“ Oh, father, stop ! ” 

“ Angel, Angel ! ” was the appeal of another 
voice from the stairway, and a child’s feet fol- 
lowed the voice. 

‘‘ What, Kitty ? ” 

“The rector, Mr. Walton, is coming into 
the yard. Going to make a call, I guess.” 

Father Waters’ face was now the picture of 
despair, but this did not paralyze his legs. One 
of these, he thrust over the window-sill. 

“ Angel ! ” he said sternly, resolutely. “ The 
yard is filling up with people. I am going ! 
Good-bye ! ” 

Now, father ! See here ! Do be reason- 
able, and I know you will. Let me manage. 
I will go down and meet all those dignita- 
ries ” 

** Waters ! ” sang out a strong, manly voice 
below. “We are on hand ! ” 

“ It is Chairman French!" groaned Father 
Waters despairingly. 

“ He may holloa till he is hoarse, father. 
You stay here. I’ll go down, take them all into 
the front door and keep them in the parlor. 
Then you scud into the back door and fix up 
and come into the parlor. Now let me man- 
age ! Don't go out of that window ! ” 


A FLUTTER IN THE WATERS’-HOME. I4I 

Another moment, Angel was descending the 
stairway smiling and laughing, meeting the se- 
lectmen, then meeting the town-clerk, then 
meeting the minister, and leading them all one 
by one into the parlor. And while they were 
waiting to see her father, Angel improved her 
opportunity and executed a lucky thought. 

“ I want you, gentlemen, to give my brother 
Joe a recommendation,” she said to the se- 
lectmen, proceeding to explain her request and 
adding, “ Oblige me by doing it now, could 
you ? ” 

“With pleasure,” said Chairman French, 
courteously. 

“ And I want one, please, of the town-clerk.” 

Mr. Oliver smiled and told Angel he was 
ready. 

** And Mr. Walton will give me one, I know,” 
said Angel. 

“ I shall be delighted to do it,” kindly said 
Mr. Walton. “ Joe is a fine boy.” 

When Sidney Waters appeared in spotless 
attire, the documents for Joe had all been made 
out. 

“Ah,” said the proud father afterwards, “it 
takes Angel to do things.” 

Yes, Angel was a leading and beloved 
agency in that house. 


142 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


She saw that the recommendations all went 
off to the post-office that day, accompanied by 
precious messages from home. And how much 
like the usual economical course pursued by 
Angel it was, when the packing up of the letter 
was attempted ! 

“There,” said Angel, using an old pair of 
scales her father had picked up somewhere, 
“ let me weigh my mail and see how much the 
postage will amount to ! Oh — my ! For the 
same amount of money I can divide my mail 
and make two letters and so get more to Joe ! 
Yes, I will! Yes, I must get my money’s 
worth of the government ” 

The mail thus divided went to the post- 
office. 

That night, Angel was sitting up a little later 
than usual. 

The wind during the day had been “ a-git- 
tin’ into the nor-reast,” as some of the old sail- 
ors in Shipton said. Consequently there had 
been by this time an arrival from the sea, and 
what a commotion overhead, a storm roaring, 
the rain smiting heavily against the window 
panes, the trees beating the air with their 
boughs as if they were boxers doubling up their 
fists and clumsily striking at one another ! 

Angel was always the last one up and she 


A FLUTTER IN THE WATERS’-HOME. 143 

attended to final duties. Her mother had been 
“ weakly ” ever since Angel could remember, 
and went to bed at an early hour. Her father 
was not weakly, but he was willing that Angel 
should attend to his duties. She now went 
round from window to window and door to 
door, making everything fast. The back door, 
she opened a second time, to set the can out 
for the milkman who came very early in the 
morning. She brought in a little pile of kind- 
ling wood from the back entry and deposited it 
near the stove. She wound up the clock on 
the mantel, the clock old and shaky and al- 
ways giving up his position as time-keeper, yet 
never fully resigning. She sat down to fold her 
hands and think awhile, and then she took up 
her Bible and read a psalm of peace. She fell 
on her knees and into a little chamber of rest 
crept awhile, and there was God’s guest, and 
found comfort. 

“ I sha’n’t need this lamp,” she said, blowing 
out her light. It will save something. I 
know the way up-stairs.” 

She left behind her the soberly ticking clock 
and was about to open the door leading up- 
stairs, when passing a window that looked out 
toward the business quarters of the town, she 
saw a suspicious glow in the sky. 


144 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


“ Why, what is that ? It doesn’t look nat- 
ural ! ” she exclaimed. 

She watched the strange light a little while 
longer. Was it a bright banner whose folds 
the rough storm-wind had thrown into such 
agitation ? 

“ Can’t be the light from any street lamps! 
Oh, how it spreads! Hark!” murmured 
Angel. “ There is a bell ringing ! ” 

She listened a moment, heard the clock 
striking unconcernedly behind her, and then 
caught that high, sharp note of alarm without. 
The next moment, she was hurrying up-stairs 
to her father’s room. 

** Oh, father ! There is a fire ! It must be 
near the Town Hall or Post Office ! Father ! 
Father ! ” warned Angel. 

Father Waters was off in his dreams catch- 
ing whales up at the North Pole, but he came 
back to Shipton promptly, dressed, and went 
out to the fire. 

** Where was it ? ” asked Angel, when he re- 
turned. 

“The Washington livery stable and then 
the Post Office, dear ! And if it hadn’t been 
for me, every letter would have been burned 
up, Angel.” 

“ How so, father? ” 


A FLUTTER IN THE WaTERS*-HOME. 14^ 

“ They thought they had saved all from the 
boxes and in the mail bags that go in the 
morning. I persisted in hunting, and found 
in a compartment for sorting letters six more. 
I grabbed them quick.” 

“ I hope ours were not burnt up.” 

“ Oh, no ! I noticed your handwriting 
among the addresses.” 

‘‘ Good ! ” 

He had seen only one of Angel’s letters. 
The other containing Joe’s recommendations 
lay in a second and unvisited compartment. 

Angel went to sleep dreaming of the arrival 
of this mail in Newfoundland. She saw Joe 
smiling as he read what the selectmen, the 
town-clerk and the minister had said about 
him. That very moment of her dream, these 
recommendations were only burnt paper amid 
the ruins, and a big rain drop falling as if in 
tearful pity on the ashy, flaky mass, sank down 
through it. 


CHAPTER XL 


HAD RATHER DIG. 

a ETTING sick of this, thoroughly," ex- 



u claimed Joe, halting before a store in St. 
John’s, Newfoundland. ‘‘ The Ann Batten has 
been sold, her cargo and everything else, and 
Cap’n Grimes says by holding on, we can 
all get home in some vessel bound for the 
States. The thing is to get something to do 
until that chance comes. A vessel will go in 
a few weeks, he says, and we can all ship 
together. Now for Henry Haven. He went 
into this rum hole, I think. I’ll pull him out, 
and then see where that store is that a man 
told me about.’’ 

He held in his hand a slip of paper contain- 
ing a description of the locality where he had 
been told “ a man to help in a store ’’ was 
needed. His first object though was to drag 
out of the dirty hole before him his shipmate, 
Henry Haven. 

I saw him go in here,’’ murmured Joe. 
** and I must get him out.’’ 


HAD RATHER DIG. 


147 


When he entered the dusky coop, he spied 
Henry occupying a bench with three other 
sailors. A young man with a frowzy head of 
red hair was eying these visitors across a dirty 
counter, uncertain whether they were custom- 
ers or impecunious loafers. If customers, did 
they want sugar and tea, or a draft from the 
bottles that gave ugly variety to the slim 
stock of groceries ? 

“Ah, Henry,” said Joe, pleasantly, laying 
a friendly hand on his shipmate’s shoulder. 
“ I have been looking for you. Let us go off 
and hunt up a chance to do some work.” 

Henry had been drinking, and his appetite 
was on the side of the young man behind the 
counter. He also had a conscience. This was 
on the side of the young sailor outside the 
counter and proved in Joe’s presence to be the 
stronger power. Henry rose and turned to 
walk out of the store. 

“ Going ? ” shouted the clerk. “ Don’t leave 
us!” 

“ Going ? ” repeated Henry. Yes, going ! ” 

He spoke decidedly, but with the tone of 
one who knew not where he was going. 

The clerk looked at Joe and grunted. He 
considered Joe as an interferer, a trespasser, but 
might have said nothing if Joe had not asked 


148 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


him a question, first examining the slip of paper 
in his hand. 

“ I want to find on this street a store, some 
corner or other, — can’t seem to make it out on 
this paper — where they want a man to help-^ 
a — a ” 

Joe hesitated. 

“ Oh,’' said the clerk, looking at the slip, 
“ this is the place. The proprietor has just got 
home, and he thinks we need waking up and 
wants to put in another hand and — and — well, 
I don’t know. He has got some big ideas, and 
he wants to extend the business.” 

“ He wants somebody to sell, I suppose?” 

“ Why, yes, or somebody to help sell ! There 
won’t be any money made unless something is 
sold. That is plain.” 

Joe looked hard at the bottles on the shelves. 

The clerk said, 

‘‘You want a chance, or your friend 
wants ” 

“ I don’t know what my friend wants, if you 
mean the man with me, but I know I don’t 
want this. I had rather dig in the dirt, now 
that I know what the chance is.” 

Joe halted on the threshold of the store, 
turning as he gave this last emphatic 
opinion. 


HAD RATHER DIG. I49 

“ Why — why — why not ? Don’t you think 
it respectable ? ” asked the astonished clerk. 

“You need not ask me. A business that 
would take a man like my friend here — ” Joe 
pointed at Henry Haven — “ and rob him of his 
senses and arouse in him an appetite that would 
make a slave and a pauper of him ” 

“ Oh, well,” said the clerk, stepping forward, 
“ we didn’t hire this place for you to give tem- 
perance lectures in — for — we — we ” 

Joe and Henry were now on the sidewalk. 

“ Come along, Joe ! ” said Henry. 

They were slowly moving away, but the clerk 
had reached the door and there shouted, 
“ Temp’rance fanatics not wanted here ! We 
are not ” 

“ You needn’t worry ! Don’t be alarmed ! 
They’ll never csdljou that ! ” replied Joe. 

“ Come, Joe ! ” said Henry. “ Come along ! ” 

As they slowly walked away, they could not 
see a man approaching from the opposite direc- 
tion but he saw them. He was one who had 
the unsteady gait of a sailor, and rolled like 
one as he entered the rum-store. His twisted 
eyes increased the sinister look of a face not 
otherwise inviting. 

** What is the row between you and those 
other men just leaving?” he asked the clerk. 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


150 

I saw them. I know them. What is to 
pay?” 

Oh, cap’n, they or one of ’em, the young- 
est, he sot up to be a kind of a judge, a fanatic, 
and gave me a piece of his temp’rance stuff. 
Not much of the temp’rance to the other man, 
but the younger got him away.” 

And interfered with the trade of the store ? ” 
said the captain. “ Well, now I am proprietor, 
and I’ll let him know he can’t come here and 
get my customers away. I know him, yes, I 
do, the puppy ! I’ll stop that. He can’t do as 
he pleases in this country, whatever he may do 
at home. I have a great mind to ” 

He stepped to the door, shaking his head 
and muttering threats. 

“ Oh, Cap’n Hartwell, I wouldn’t go after him ! 
He ain’t worth the noticin’,” said the clerk, ap- 
peasingly. 

Capt. Hartwell, who had just returned from 
Europe by steamer, having sold his vessel and 
cargo in a Scottish port, now stood on the 
door-step of the dirty den which he owned, 
and sent a variety of curses after Joe, declaring 
he would “ yet settle with that feller.” These 
curses were not heard though. Joe heard some- 
thing very different, even a bird’s notes up in 
a tree. He took a benediction from the bird’s 


HAD RATHER DIG. 151 

music and said to Henry, That bird sings as 
if it were wishing us good luck ! Hope we 
may get it. Don’t know where to look for it 
though. That hole won’t give it to us — back 
there— Old Rum Hole ! ” 

Joe emphasized strongly his words. Henry 
did not dissent from them, though his breath 
still showed he had been tampering with 
temptation in the saloon. He could reason 
straight. He saw his duty as a plain path. 
He submitted readily to Joe’s lead. 

“ I had rather dig in the dirt than sell liquor 
in that store or any other. There is no disgrace 
to the digging; there is to the selling, Henry.” 
“ Let’s dig then, Joe ! ” 

“ What, Henry ? ” 

** Why dig, boy ! Let’s go out in the coun- 
try and hire out with any farmers who want 

help. There may be some fall work ” 

“ And wait until that vessel goes to the 
States ? ” 

Yes, that one where the owner said he’d 
give us all a chance to ship together.” 

“We might do that. It won’t do any harm 
to try. Come on — or, hold on a little while. 
We might get a cup of coffee and a little lunch. 
We may have to walk some distance, you 
know.” 


152 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


“ Very well.” 

Joe had one other reason. He knew that 
Henry would be more presentable and more 
likely to give a favorable impression if there 
were a brief waiting. 

After their lunch, they started off. It was 
a fine day for walking. There were brilliant 
autumn shades still in the forests, tempting a 
walker onward, and the air bracing and invig- 
orating gave the walker good support while he 
tramped on and enjoyed the scenery. But 
though there was an abundance of enjoyment, 
no chance for work was found. 

“ Do you want any help on your farm ? ” 
was the staple inquiry. 

The staple reply was a shake of the head. 

At last they came to an establishment so 
plainly one of thrift,that Henry said confidently, 
“ Now, I know they want a feller here ! ” 

And when a gray-headed old farmer in the 
yard was questioned, he replied, “ I would like 
to have help for a few weeks, but I can only 
take one of you. But, but, I don’t know ye! ” 

Joe’s recommendations from home had not 
arrived for a very good reason, and he could 
only report the fact of non-arrival. 

‘‘But I can speak for him,'' asserted Joe, 
pointing to Henry. 


HAD RATHER DIG. I $3 

‘*And I can speak for him^' said Henry, 
pointing to Joe. 

“ You — you are not English? ’* 

“No, Yankees!” said Henry promptly. 
“ Supposing you try us, or him ! That will 
soon settle it whether we are good for any- 
thing.” 

“ No, I advise you to try himy' said Joe. 
“ Good-bye ! I am off ! ” 

The old farmer laughed at the retreating 
Joe, said the good feeling they showed was a 
recommendation, and at once made a bargain 
with Henry. 

Joe walked on. 

He felt peculiarly lonely after leaving Henry. 
The more he thought upon his situation, the 
more did he realize his loneliness. “ If I only 
had those recommendations from home it would 
be something,” he thought. He was in a 
strange country. Its landscape, its people, all 
things, had an air of newness to him, while they 
were really features and fixtures of an old 
country. 

Don’t know anybody 1 ” he said. “ Every- 
thing seems strange.” 

He was little inclined to stop and ask for 
employment, so strong was this sense of 
strangeness. He passed house after house 


154 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


where he might have stopped and his request 
possibly been answered favorably, but this 
feeling of unhomelikeness prevented him. He 
walked on. In his ears, there kept echoing the 
words and music of an old hymn Joe had 
learned at home and sometimes used in the 
Sunday-School, “ Tm a pilgrim and I’m a 
stranger.” 

During all his absence from the house on 
the lane leading to the dock, even when in 
Greenland waters, far off amid ice and snow, 
he had not once had such a feeling of home- 
sickness. 

“ ‘ I’m a pilgrim and I’m a stranger,’ ” he now 
sang aloud gently and very mournfully. 
“ Well,” he moaned, “ I guess I am homesick.” 

Suddenly, at one side of this pilgrim-road, 
there appeared amid some old trees a house 
that looked so home-like, so cosy, so inviting, 
that Joe stopped involuntarily, and exclaimed, 
“ Why, how much like home that looks ! ” 

And yet it was in its details very much 
unlike the house that held the Waters-family. 
This was a low, one story and a half house, 
with dormer-windows in the roof, with a big 
disproportionate porch over the front door, 
something like a huge Quaker bonnet much too 
big for the wearer. It was very unlike the 


HAD RATHER DIG. 


I5S 

Waters-home. And yet Joe’s heart went out 
to the place at once, all his affections going in a 
rush toward the spot hitherto unknown to him. 

Isn’t she a beauty ! ” he said. 

‘‘ She ” was not a beauty. The walls bore 
the marks of age, and a fence near by and a 
shed near it were decrepit. 

“ Why, she could go twenty knots an hour ! ” 
said the young sailor enthusiastically. 

If this old house had been afloat, ** she ” 
would have made the clumsiest and slowest of 
tubs imaginable. 

“ Feel as if I had been born there!” mur- 
mured Joe. ‘‘And is that grandmother? I 
declare ! ” 

His thoughts were now turned toward an old 
woman who was coming out of the porch with 
its Quaker-bonnet top. 

She did not see Joe. Her eyes and her 
thoughts were on the water-pail she carried in 
her hand. She stepped slowly along over the 
yet green grass-plot near the house and ap- 
proached an old well whose circular wall of 
stone had been carried about three feet above 
the ground, and over this high, venerable curb- 
ing she now leaned. 

“She going to draw that water alone?” 
asked Joe. “ Not if Joe Waters can help it ! ” 


56 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Joe had a certain readiness to help and a 
tact and gallantry that had often done him 
good service when he served others. He 
stepped forward promptly, touched his hat, 
and said in his most cheerful, obliging tone, 

“ Madame, that is too hard for you. Allow 
me the pleasure of drawing the water.” 

** Oh, I don’t know as it is too hard,” she 
replied, but in a tone that declared it was 
really rather too hard for her. 

“ She has a pleasant face, really,” thought 
Joe, “and a pleasant voice too. Quite grand- 
motherly ! ” 

He drew her water, and then proceeded to 
carry the pail toward the house. 

“ Oh — I — can take it, sir ! I thank you,” said 
the old lady, startled to think she was allow- 
ing an entire stranger thus to serve her though 
she had already noticed with favor his bright, 
attractive face and sunny voice, and had been 
flattered by the ready, easy and polite way 
in which he had served her. The thought 
that he was a stranger checked all disposition 
to receive any such attention as the bearing of 
a pail of water into her house. 

“ Why, he may be a buggler,” she thought 
in alarm. 

“ I can take it, thank you,” she said aloud. 


HAD RATHER DIG. 


157 


She had mistaken her man. Joe Waters 
did not draw water for old ladies and then let 
them lug a heavy pail to the house. He 
paid no attention to the present remonstrant. 
He continued to carry this pail of crystal and 
did not stop until he had reached the broad 
stone step before the porch. It seemed to Joe 
as if he had been looking at that step ever since 
childhood, and yet if he had been ordered to 
say whenever before this hour he had actually 
seen it, or be hung as an alternative if unable to 
declare, he would have dangled from the rope’s 
end. 

“ There, there, thank you ! ” said the old 
lady in a grateful, scared way ; ‘‘ I — I will take 
it.” 

She trembled at the thought how near to an 
entrance this buggler ” had come. 

The poor, homeless fellow did want so much 
to see the inside of that door and find out what 
a** home ” down in Newfoundland looked like. 

** Thank you ! I’ll take it ! ” she said again, 
and said it very stiffly. 

Oh, let me ! ” 

There, there ! That will do ! ” said the old 
lady in a nervous way, fluttering around the 
water-pail like a hen over her one, valuable 
chicken. 


158 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Joe was a tactician. 

He was also as wilful as human nature 
is generally. He meant to carry his point and 
see the inside of that door. 

“ Won’t you please — just — just give me a 
drink of water?” he said in a tone of voice 
slightly rebuking, and at the same time he 
touched his hat courteously. 

“Oh — oh— certainly ! ” said the old lady, 
who felt that it would be unchristian not to 
give a cup of cold water to this wanderer. 

The old lady bustled in, pail in hand, and 
Joe had one glimpse of a big, old-fashioned fire- 
place where a fire lazily burned on the hearth. 
He saw a tall clock in a corner. He saw a 
little stand on which were a few pieces of crock- 
ery as if set for the lunch of two people. 

“ If it doesn’t look like home ! The place 
where they cook and eat and sit, I guess,” 
thought Joe. 

In the living-room of the Waters-family, 
though, there was no tall clock. There was 
no open fireplace. When the table was set, 
the always hungry circle there could never 
have been satisfied with the food in dishes for 
two or three. 

The old lady was now standing before the 
shelves of a little closet containing among 


HAD RATHER DIG. 1 59 

other ware a silver mug and a crockery mug. 
She kept her body carefully between the “ bug- 
gler’s ” eyes and the silver mug, and prudently 
brought out the mug of earthen ware, a little 
blue relic, on one side of which was a fat man 
in blue bowing to a slim lady in blue. 

She filled this with water, so clear, so cold ! 

“ Delicious ! It tastes like water at home ! ” 
said Joe. 

Nonsense ! 

The water at home was apt to be warm after 
running several miles in the logs of an old- 
fashioned aqueduct.” 

“ My mother always liked blue ware,” re- 
marked Joe. ** This is real pretty.” 

The old lady wanted to inquire about this 
interesting young “ buggler s ” mother, but for 
prudential reasons she refrained. She re- 
mained silent. 

“ I would like to see my mother. Somehow 
this place looks real home-like,” observed Joe. 

“ You got a mother ? ” asked the old lady, 
remembering that if she were talking with a 
“ buggler,” it was best to keep his better senti- 
ments worked up into a good state of activity. 
There was protection for her interests in this 
course, and she might also save him from the 
path of destruction. 


l6o A SALT WATER HERO. 

'‘Oh, yes!” replied Joe. "She is a good 
many miles from here. I come from the 
States.” 

His plaintive tone had now changed to a 
proud one. 

"Sakes!” she exclaimed. "You did? I 
was born there too.” 

" Why, I thought,” remarked Joe, cordially, 
and with the air of an old friend, " I thought 
you didn’t talk like the people round here.” 

"Oh, no! ’’she said. "A different trainin’ 
altogether! Won’t you — step in? ” 

Joe went to a "home-like ” rocking-chair he 
had been covetously eying for some time, and 
sat down on its soft, comfortable cushion. 
The conversation now was quite free and 
unembarrassed. Joe had various questions to 
ask about the house and neighborhood, and 
though prudence told her occasionally to " be- 
ware,” the old lady answered his questions 
quite readily. 

" You live alone ? ” said Joe. 

" My granddarter lives with me,” she replied, 
" and sometimes I have — others.” 

This last word was a prudential addition. 
She began to think she might have been too 
free with this supposed young " countryman,” 
and there was a little drawing back into the 


HAD RATHER DIG. 


l6l 

shell of her former reserve. She felt, though, 
that if this intruder should begin an investiga- 
tion of the forces of her castle, she could only 
show a single soldier, a female warrior, that 
granddaughter. She therefore threw in occa- 
sional remarks about this member of her 
household. 

“ She is purty stout and vigorous,” she ex- 
claimed, abruptly. 

‘‘Who?” inquired Joe. 

“ My granddarter.” 

At different times, in her answers to Joe’s 
questions about the interesting spot he had 
stumbled on, she made these statements. 

“ And purty stout in the arms.” 

“ And purty tall.” 

“ And she has got a good head.” 

“ And she has had a lot of sperience, if I do 
say it.” 

“ People can’t get ahead of her. Quiet but 
deep ! ” 

“ She can look through one.” 

“ A good hand to manage.” 

Combining all these features of body and 
character, Joe sketched before his fancy a tall, 
stout, vigorous, shrewd, calculating woman, 
unmarried without doubt, and an able adminis- 
trator of home and farm affairs. 


i 62 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


‘*She can draw water and milk cows and 
rake hay and go to town with the butter. 
Harness up of course, and I dare say is good 
as a man,” thought Joe, before whom towered 
this tall, stalwart, energetic, resolute female. 
** I have said nothing about wanting to hire 
out, and I don’t know as it will do any good.” 

But Joe was not one to abandon a purpose 
easily, and then the old lady remarked, 
** Work, though, is sometimes hard. Our 
place is small, but there is always suthin to 
be done ” 

‘^Now,” thought Joe, “is my chance. It 
will do no harm to ask — ” and he asked ; 

“ I would like to get a chance to do farm 
work awhile. I told you I was a sailor and 
was really on my way to the States. Just want 
to job a few weeks until a vessel sails. I have 
got a shipmate back on a farm we found since 
leaving the city, and if you would like help for 
a few weeks, I dare say we might make a bar- 
gain.” 

Two of ’em!” thought the old lady, her 
uneasiness returning. “ Why, there may be 
a whole band of ’em cornin’ into the neigh- 
borhood to murder us in our beds. They’ll 
git together and scheme and plot and some 
night we will all be gone or found dead in our 


HAD RATHER DIG. 


163 

beds. What do I know about this young 
feller from the States ? If he is a sailor, why 
don’t he hire on board a ship ? ” 

She replied in a very doubtful tone, not 
wishing to discourage him, and yet not intend- 
ing to hold out any reason for hope. 

“ I — I think not. I don’t believe my grand- 
darter would encourage it. I shouldn’t want 
to do a thing without askin’ her.” 

** How soon will she be here ? ” 

** Hark ! There she is now ! ” 

Joe heard a step, but it was not in the 
little entry by which he had entered. 

‘‘ There is another door,” he inferred. ** She 
steps off like an Amazon, I expect.” 

‘‘ You might ask her,” he suggested. 

‘‘Well, sir.” 

The tone of this was rather dignified, cool, 
if not icy. She had a conviction that things 
had gone far enough. What did she know 
about this young man ? 


CHAPTER XII. 

WOULD THEY HIRE HIM? 

J OE felt so much at home in that room that 
he might have continued indefinitely in 
that easy chair. He noticed that the old 
lady was looking at him sharply, rubbing her 
hands, catching her breath, ejaculating, ** I — I 

— don’t know ” 

** What say, madam? ” 

“ While I am talking with her ” 

“ Oh, you want the room ? I beg your par- 
don, madam. Certainly, certainly! ” 

Up he sprang and hastened out of the room, 
expecting any moment he might meet that 
formidable granddaughter. 

I expect her name is Tartar,” thought Joe. 
“ I don’t care though, if I can only get a place 
where to run my head in at night and a chance 
to keep from starving the rest of the time.” 

To occupy his moments of waiting, he went 
to a wood-pile in the adjoining old shed, seized 
the axe at a chopping-block, and began to split 
wood. 


WOULD THEY HIRE HIM? 165 

“ This does make me think of home,” said 
Joe. 

He was right in this at last, for in the old 
shed at home, he had spent many hours cut- 
ting wood for Angel’s kitchen-fire. 

Joe’s axe rang out a merry tune there at the 
wood-pile. He felt interested in his work. It 
killed time. 

He would have felt still more interested and 
time would have been slaughtered more effec- 
tively even, if he could have been an autumn 
fly on the warm ceiling of the room he had 
just left and heard what was said by the old 
lady and her granddaughter, the ** Tartar.” 

“ What do you say, grandmother? A young 
man want to hire out ? Why, who is he ? 
Did you ask his name ? ” 

“ Why, no ! He came along here and helped 
me bring in my water — would do it, you see ! 
He is real pleasant. I only let him come as 
far as the door and then he wanted a drink of 
water ” 

There was a twinkle lighting up the grand- 
daughter’s eyes. 

**You forget, grandmother, about the ped- 
dler who came along and took us all in, want- 
ing to sell something and then asking for water, 
and going away so very polite, and you know 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


1 66 

we missed Cousin Charles’ hat after he had 
gone.” 

Why, yes, I did forget that ! Where were 
my senses ? Hark ! ” 

“ I believe he is splitting wood,” said the 
granddaughter, going to the window. “ I 
can’t see him.” 

“ I call that imperdent,” declared the old 
lady, giving her words an emphatic Yankee 
intonation. “ He will go off with the axe. I 
will stop him.” 

** Had you better not give him your answer, 
too ? Why, I can milk and bring the water, 
you know, and when there is any extra work, 
we can get a hand for a day or so. I was only 
thinking of the bill of expense, grandmother. 
Why, we are not dependent on a man ! ” Tar- 
tar spoke decidedly. 

** Of course not, but this young chap was so 
easy and he sot down in that chair there — I’m 
glad I didn’t let him set down in the best one, 
for rockin’ away as he did so comfortably, he 
would have got it all out of jint — hark! ” 

** He is splitting yet.” 

Both females looked out of the window, but 
they could see nothing. They could hear the 
chopper, who unconscious of any adverse 
criticism, was cutting away as energetically as 


WOULD THEY HIRE HIM? 167 

if Angel at home had just sent him out to the 
shed for an armful of wood to hurry up her 
baking for dinner. 

“ And you know when it comes to a corner, 
grandmother, I really can cut wood, cut kind- 
lings any way,” said the younger and vigorous 
female. 

“ I know it, but you see he was so pleasant 
and a kind of takin* ” 

“How old was he, grandmother?” asked 
Tartar, her voice sensibly softening. 

“ Oh, a young crittur, a kind of a kid, a 
rovin’ round I dare say, and he has got a ship- 
mate or suthin’ else down at another house and 
they’ll put their heads together and do any- 
thing they please with the neighborhood. 
There he goes agin, a-choppin’ away ! Now I 
call that a-takin’ liberties ! I’ll speak to him 
right away.” 

“ I think I would, grandmother,” said Tar- 
tar, in a business-like tone of voice. “ I can do 
the work — all we need, as a rule, certainly, 
when we are not working the land.” 

“ I’ll speak to him agin. We don’t want 
him a-hangin’ round, a perfect stranger ” 

The old lady went to the door, and called, 
“ Look here, sir ! ” 

Her voice naturally was a pleasant one, mild 


i68 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


and sonorous, but she was hardening its tones, 
stiffening them into a cold, firm, commercial 
quality. 

“Oh, there she is!” thought Joe, throwing 
down his axe and leaving the pile. “ It all de- 
pends on that other female, that tough old 
‘ granddarter,’ that Tartar.” 

“ We think we don’t want you,” said the old 
lady. “ We have talked it over.” 

Joe in his energetic way was springing over 
the ground, his bright blue eyes sparkling, his 
cheeks flushed with color, his cap thrown back, 
and showing a high, intelligent forehead. By 
the time he had reached the old stone step that 
still looked so familiar, the old lady was relent- 
ing, for she had become far more deeply inter- 
ested in this young countryman than she had 
for a single moment allowed to Tartar. 

“What did you say, madam?” said Joe, 
politely touching his cap, and then pulling it 
forward and tucking away the brown ringlets 
that would go a-wandering. 

“ Oh,” said she, mournfully and sincerely also, 
“ I suppose we can’t keep you.” 

Joe’s countenance fell. He was indeed sorry. 
He not only showed it in his face but in his 
voice when bespoke. He only said falteringly, 
“Oh-h!” 


WOULD THEY HIRE HIM? 169 

That was enough. 

His voice sounded as if he had been hurt. 

He did not think anybody else was listening, 
for he had forgotten that moment about Tar- 
tar. He did not think anybody was look- 
ing. Two eyes though were planted at the 
crack of the door, and from this sheltered posi- 
tion in the rear, unobserved, had inspected Joe’s 
face sharply. 

** Well ! ” said Joe, recovering from his disap- 
pointment, his hopeful temperament at once 
asserting itself. “ Perhaps they will need me at 
another place.” 

He had dropped his head and was withdraw- 
ing his foot from the doorstep when he looked 
up again and said, “ Could I trouble you for 
another drink of water before I go ? ” 

The repentant old lady was about to tell him 
energetically, “You can have a whole barrel- 
ful,” when a voice in the rear said, “ I will get 
it, grandmother ! ” 

“ It is Tartar,” thought Joe. 

She appeared another minute, not presenting 
now the blue mug that Joe had admired but 
the silver one that the grandmother had pru- 
dently kept in concealment. The grand- 
daughter held it out dripping with crystal. 

“ Here ! ” she said, musically. 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


170 

What did Joe see as he looked up? 

His emotion was so great he almost dropped 
the precious mug. 

Was he back on the deck of the old whaler, 
the Ann Batten ? Were ice and snow all about 
him ? Was he looking into the bright, hand- 
some face of one of the boys of the ship, into 
the soft, dark eyes, into the very soul of open- 
ness and truthfulness? 

Joe’s hand shook. The water fell in a little 
spattering shower upon the cleanly swept floor. 

Involuntarily, he exclaimed, “ Percy ! ” — and 
stopped. ** It isn’t Percy, is it ? ” he then asked. 

The two women looked at one another in won- 
der as they observed his agitation, and it was 
not lessened when stammeringly he said,“ Ex- 
cuse me, t-t-this-t-this can’t be Percy J-James’ 
s-sister ? ” 

“You — you know Percy James?” almost 
shrieked the old lady. 

“We were on board the Ann Batten together, 
and he said he had a twin sister and her name 
was Seraph and ” 

“ That is Seraph,” said the old lady, nodding 
toward the young woman, “ and I am his grand- 
mother, and you ” 

She hesitated. In her tumult of feeling, all 
her ideas seemed to be going from her in a 


WOULD THEY HIRE HIM? 171 

kind of freshet and she could not stop them 
and separate them. “ I was never so mixed 
up,” she afterward confessed to Seraph. 

“You — you — are not Joe — ” Seraph hesi- 
tated. 

“ I am Joe Waters.” 

“ That is it ! The very one ! ” screamed the 
old lady. “ Percy wrote about it. Come in, 
come in ! ” 

It almost seemed as if she pulled him into 
the entry, heaping upon him such words of 
welcome, and then seating him in the very best 
chair hitherto withheld from him, then bring- 
ing out the precious silver mug brimming now 
with hot coffee. 

“ There,” sighed the old lady, “ I jest hate 
myself to think I was so cool to you.” 

“ Oh, it is all right. You did not know me,” 
said Joe. He added rapturously, “ I feel as if 
I had got home.” 

“And we ain’t a-goin’ to let you go agin 
nuther, yet a while,” said the old lady. “ Ser- 
aph, you git Percy’s slippers ! ” 

Seraph said very little, but Joe noticed how 
smiling and happy was her beautiful face and 
that she was constantly on hand to bring slip- 
pers or more hot creamy coffee, or to take on 
the other hand his shoes and set them down on 


172 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


the hearth, or to hang his cap on a nail behind 
the door. 

It was touching to see the grandmother, who 
could not seem to do enough for Joe, and as- 
sured him about a hundred times that it was 
“the next thing to seein’ Percy.” It was 
speedily settled that Joe was to stay there long 
as he pleased, and while Joe felt that he would 
no more stipulate for wages than ask his father, 
or mother, or Angel, any pay for help, yet the 
old lady told Seraph in private that she meant 
to give him “suthin’ han’sum for his work.” 

That work began very soon, for it was now 
nearing the time for tea, and Joe asked the 
grandmother “ if there were not some cows to 
be milked.” 

“ Can you milk?” asked Seraph. 

“No — but I can learn.” 

“ ril get the pail and show you the barn, but 
I think you had better let me do it to-night.” 

The barn was an old one like every other 
building on the grounds, but overhead it was 
stuffed with hay, and stuffed at either end. A 
horse and a cow drowsily stared out of quar- 
ters that were enclosed with hay and looked as 
if no cold draughts could reach them. Every- 
thing had a snug, warm look. It was a pleas- 
ure to follow Seraph into the old barn, to follow 


WOULD THEY HIRE HIM? 1 73 

her graceful while energetic step, to catch the 
flash of her dark eyes — not a sharp, hard flash, 
but a softened brilliancy — and then how much 
music there was to her voice, as she stroked and 
patted her cow, saying in low, rich tones, 
Volie— Vo-lie— Vo-lie ! ” 

“ That her name ? ” 

** Her name is Violet, but that is one syll- 
able too long, and I have got it down into 
Volie.” 

“ I like it better than Violet. That seems 
hard. Volie is soft and pleasant.” 

** You like it ? lam glad you do.” 

“I would like to hear her say ‘Joe,’” 
thought the young sailor. “ It is real sharp, 
though. Wish my name was something like 
Volie.” 

“ Mr. Waters, do you think ” 

“ Excuse me, but that isn’t my name.” 

“Joe, then!” As she said it, she let out 
such a stream of music that Joe thought it was 
the handsomest name in the world. 

“Do you think you had better try to milk 
Volie?” 

“ Oh, let me try, please ! Sailors have to 
learn to do about everything, and some of them 
are pretty rough duties. I think I had much 
rather be a farmer than a sailor.” 


174 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


To prove that he was fitted for farm-work, 
he seated himself on Seraph’s milking-stool. 

“ I am afraid that is a little uneasy,” she 
told him. “ One of the legs is loose.” 

“ It will do for this time. I will mend it in 
the morning. You have got somebody to 
help you, you know. There ! This goes very 
well. I had a neighbor at home who kept 
cows and I would watch him and I got quite 
an idea about milking. So, Volie ! That is a 
good girl ! Quiet ! ” 

This “ girl ” was uneasily twisting her head 
and once slapped Joe in the face with her tail. 

“Volie! Volie! Be good!” said Seraph, 
in a low, sweet voice, half a coax, half a com- 
mand. 

Violet obeyed. 

“ I’ll just go to see about some hay for Jack, 
the horse.” 

“ Let me look after it. Seraph ! ” 

He did not ask if he might say “ Seraph,” 
neither had he inquired if he might say “ grand- 
ma ” to the old lady. Everything seemed so 
home-like, he began quickly to use these titles 
as if by long and well-grounded right through 
a kind of blood-relationship. 

“I will look after it. Seraph! See how I 
am getting along ! My pail ” 


WOULD THEY HIRE HIM? 175 

Here Seraph caught a suspicious sound and 
ran to the cow’s stall. It is a sound that one 
cannot easily mistake. 

“ Anything the matter, Joe ? ” 

“ Eh — eh — yes ! I said * my pail ’ and as if 
she wanted to dispute it, she lifted her hind 
foot and fetched it such a kick that over it 
went ! ” 

With a downcast face, he held up the empty 
pail. 

Seraph stood and shook her sides while the 
tears ran down her cheeks as she laughed. 

“ Shall I whip her? I feel like it! ” he said. 
** I am — some mad.” 

“ Oh, no ! I couldn’t help laughing. You 
excuse it. You let me take her! Really, I 
am afraid there will be no milk for supper. 
You feed the horse, please ! ” 

How he did envy her skill as he stood and 
heard the full, steady streams of milk gush 
down into Seraph’s pail ! There at Jack’s stall 
he could hear the rhythm of those copious jets 
as they struck the pail, while before, the flow 
for him had been so mean and dribbling ! 
Violet too, contentedly chewed away on her 
supper. 

During Joe’s regime she had hysterically 
rolled her eyes round, frantically whisked her 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


176 

tail, and finally gave Joe's pail a kick with 
such fierceness that it almost took his breath 
away. 

Seraph was considerate and did not tease 
him, nor did she report the accident to her 
grandmother. When he was not looking, 
though, the corners of her mouth would twitch 
into a smile. 

“She is an angel indeed," said Joe, admir- 
ingly, as he watched her conversation at the 
supper table but heard not one allusion to his 
awkwardness. 

He thought of his Angel at home, and at 
once hit upon a name for this new celestial be- 
ing in Newfoundland. 

“ She is the other Angel. Angel and 
T’other Angel ! I ought to be happy," he 
thought. 

What an evening of comfort he passed! 
Joe liked to be trusted and admired. He sat 
before the open fire, telling in his easy, social 
way about his friends at home, about his adven- 
tures in Greenland, and especially all about 
Percy James. 

“ You don’t know when Percy will get back ? " 
he said to the grandmother. 

“ Only what I have told you, that he went in 
the George Augustus to the other side. The 


WOULD THEY HIRE HIM? 1 77 

vessel arrived there, and we heard of that in the 
papers. We know he must be safe.” 

“ Hope so ! ” murmured Seraph, who was 
bending over her sewing work in her lap. 

Oh, yes ! No doubt about that ! ” said Joe, 
assuringly. 

What doubt about any one’s safety could be 
cherished in that room whose language of pur- 
ring fire and ticking clock was that of peace and 
stability — forever and forever? 

At last. Grandma James said, ‘'Git the 
Psalter, Seraph ! And I want my prayer-book, 
too.” 

Seraph took an old, leather-covered Psalter 
from a shelf and read a psalm. 

“She has a beautiful voice,” thought Joe. 
“ David’s harp couldn’t have sounded better 
when he got up that psalm.” 

Then they all knelt, and Grandma James said 
a prayer that seemed to gather up all their needs 
and take them straight to God. It was like 
spreading another roof over their heads Joe 
thought, and the roof grew thicker and stronger 
when they said together, “Our Father.” 

“ Seems ever so much like home,” said Joe 
aloud when they had risen from their knees. 

“ Does it?” said the happy Grandma James. 
“ I hope it will up in Percy’s room too.” 


178 A SALT WATER HERO. 

Here she took a candle from a shelf and 
lighted it. 

“Am I going to sleep in Percy’s room, 
grandma? I shall like that. I shall feel at 
home, too,” replied Joe. 

He certainly felt at home for a while, up in a 
snug retreat over the kitchen. It was simply 
furnished, holding just a bed, two chairs and a 
little yellow stand. Above this stand was a 
looking-glass. 

“ And what is this?” wondered Joe, making 
a little examination of the room after Grandma 
James had left. “This picture up here above 
my bed ?” 

He held his candle up to a sea-sketch, that of 
a cheap print on the wall. The sea was blue 
and the ship on it was black. A mammoth 
whale bigger than the ship was sporting in the 
water. A boat was approaching the whale. 
The boat was painted yellow. Its crew wore 
the most gayly colored rig, and the whole effect 
was that of a brilliant bouquet the artist was 
tendering to the whale. The fish was repre- 
sented as opening its jaws and it seemed to be 
the natural and only reply the whale could 
make to such a highly colored mouthful. 

“ Interesting ! ” exclaimed Joe, and took away 
his candle. 


CHAPTER XIII. 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. 

<< HIS is a very comfortable bed/' thought 



Joe. “ I should say my sister Angel 


made it, as it feels so very good. Oh dear! 
Sleepy!” 

He yawned two or three times, thought 
about the picture over his head, congratulated 
himself that he was not on board a rough 
whaler, wished Percy James were at home and 
yawned a few times more. Then he gave an 
uneasy turn in his bed like the nervous start of 
a ship, some of whose ropes had been cast off, 
and was — gone ! The last rope had been 
dropped ! He was adrift on the Sea of Sleep. 
He was in a vessel without rudder, a captain or 
a crew. He was just a passenger and the 
only soul on board. It proved to be an Arctic 
voyage, for he was off on a tossing, icy sea. 
He then thought he was in the boat of a whal- 
ing ship. He was only ten feet from a whale’s 
mouth. Between him and the awful mouth 


l8o A SALT WATER HERO. 

suddenly appeared Percy J ames. As the whale’s 
jaws were just about to close on Percy, Joe 
seized him by one of his legs and tried to pull 
him back, shrieking “ Percy ! ” and awoke. 

“ Where am I ! ” thought Joe, trying to get 
together his scattered senses. 

“Oh,” he said at last, “ down in Newfound- 
land, in Percy James’ room.” 

Just here, he caught the click of a door-latch. 
The door opened. A lamp-ray shone in, and a 
soft voice said, “ Did you speak, Joe? ” 

“ If I close my eyes, she’ll think I am asleep,” 
reasoned Joe, who was ashamed to think he 
had roused the household by his furious yell- 
ing. 

The light moved steadily toward Joe’s bed- 
side, a soft step attending the light, and a 
motherly face looked down on Joe. 

Here Joe gave a decided snore. 

“ Poor boy ! ” he heard her exclaim. “ He 
is fast asleep. And I won’t turn him away 
nuther.” 

She sniffled as if she were crying, and then 
Grandma James’ soft step and the light also 
passed out of the room, the door closing gen- 
tly behind her. 

“ Fast asleep ?” said Joe, kicking off the bed- 
clothes. “ I am wide-awake as an eagle.” His 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. l8l 

conscience was troubling him, saying, “You 
deceived grandma. You snored a lie.” When 
he asked, “ Hark ! And what is that I see ? ” 

Was the floor on fire ? And where did those 
voices come from, even out of that strange glow 
on the floor? 

“I must see what that is,” thought Joe, 
stepping lightly out of bed and approaching 
stealthily that bright centre. ‘‘Why, it is a 
hole in the floor opening down into the kitchen ! 
Perhaps it is to let the heat up, or maybe a 
funnel came up through there once. I will put 
my face down to it and see what is going on. 
Wish I could see something or somebody. 
Can see only the top of Grandma James’ table. 
Hark ! ” 

“ He must have been a-dreamin’,’’ said a 
voice down in the kitchen. 

“That is Grandma James,” said Joe. “I 
know her voice, but who is that ? ” 

In rough tones, somebody said, “ Look out 
for him ! He will bear watching.” 

“Lookout for him !” thought Joe, crouch- 
ing closer to the hole in the floor. “ Who are 
you ? You probably need looking after ! Y our 
voice sounds natural, and yet I can’t seem to 
spot you. Hold on ! What else is to be said 
about this person up here, who, in your opin- 


I82 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


ion, needs watching? You are not Seraph. 
That is sure. She never had such a rasping, 
hobgoblin voice. Now, secondly ! ” 

Joe then heard a very interesting conversa- 
tion. It was mostly about Joe Waters. 

“Cousin Charles, I think I can trust him/' 
said Grandma James. 

“ What do you know about him ? ” asked the 
other voice. 

“ I know Percy likes him. The last letter 
we got from Percy told us about him.” 

“ Percy did not know. That is my opin- 
ion. I object to your taking in all sorts of 
people. Coming along about three miles from 
here I met a colored man, then an Indian, 
and the last time it was a Yankee sailor, and I 
know it was one of that set in the Ann Batten. 
It would be like you to let in all three.” 

“ I certainly should, if I thought it was my 
duty.” 

“ I protest against it. Your relatives have 
got something to say. You know as well as I 
do, that there are things in this house that are 
worth having, money and so on. In the back 
room — it is very careless, near the door ” 

“ Back room ! No such thing. ” 

“ Well, front room, the drawer of the table 
under the west window.” 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. 183 

“Nonsense! You know, Cousin Charles, I 
wouldn’t keep it in such an exposed place.” 

“ I hope you wouldn’t keep it in any of the 
drawers in the front hall ? ” 

“ The idee I ” 

“ Not in that spare room opening out of this 
kitchen ? ” 

Here Joe took a noiseless part in the conver- 
sation. 

“ The old vulture ! He keeps chasing her 
round from room to room. Acts as if he 
wanted to find out for himself. He is the one 
who needs to be looked after. I have a great 
mind to go down and put him out of the house 
immediately.” 

Here Grandma James spoke once more: 

Cousin Charles, I can look after my own 
money ” 

“ Of course you can, but you might let your 
relatives help you. I have some interest in 
this property ” 

“ But not in my savings.” 

“ You can't have saved much.” 

“ No matter how much. I don't choose to 
tell you. It is in a safe place. There ! ” 

The party above, at the hole in the floor, 
again took part in the conversation, though si- 
lently. 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


184 

“ The old screw ! First, the place where the 
money is, and then how much. He is an old 
auger. Don’t I wish I knew where I have 
heard that voice ! ” 

“ Very well ! ” said the strange party below in 
an injured tone. “ I only meant your own 
good. I would like to say this, though, and 
have you believe me. Don’t let in tramps, 
Indians, negroes, Yankees — and I don’t know 
what else ” 

“ They are good as you and ” 

^‘Better, you were going to say. You’ll be 
sorry for that.” 

‘H’ll dress and go down,” said the indignant 
sailor, but here, Joe heard a door slam, and 
knew it would be useless to interfere. 

He now heard a door open and the strange 
voice shouted, ** Say ! ” 

Joe felt in the dark for his pants and was 
slipping them on when he caught these words, 

‘‘You tell that young man I told him to be 
off.” 

“ I shan’t mention it to him. I have confi- 
dence in him and I shan’t trouble him with any 
words about you or any other meddler. I 
don’t want him to know anything about this.” 

“ He will get a piece of my mind before long 
—ha, ha ! ” 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. 1 85 

The door slammed again. 

Joe all the time was dressing quickly, but 
hearing carriage wheels out in the yard, he 
went to the window. The moon was shining, 
and Joe could make out some kind of a vehicle 
which quickly disappeared. 

“ No use to dress now ! ” said Joe. “ Grandma 
wouldn’t like to see me down there, I im- 
agine from what she said.” 

He then heard another voice in the kitchen, 
a voice that could be heard distinctly at the very 
first. Soon it was on too low a key to be au- 
dible. Joe very much regretted this, for he 
liked to hear Seraph’s voice. Then too, the 
conversation principally was about Joe Waters. 

“ Cousin Charles has gone, grandma ! I 
heard his wheels. A shame, isn’t it ! ” 

“Yes, a shame ! I left the door open jest a 
crack so that you might hear. I’ll never turn 
away that boy up-stairs.” 

“ Of course, I wouldn’t.” 

This declaration of opinion comforted Joe. 

“And I shall tell Joe nothin’ about this. I 
have confidence in him, and I don’t want him 
to be bothered. It’s a plaguy shame ! Don’t 
tell him. Seraph ! ” 

“ Of course not, grandma ! And ” 

Here the young woman’s voice was dropped 


1 86 A SALT WATER HERO. 

still lower and it was only a very pleasant but 
unintelligible, tantalizing murmur. Joe waited 
until the sounds below had entirely ceased, un- 
til the light had faded away. Then he returned 
to his bed. 

“ It doesn’t seem like home now,” he 
murmured. 

Singular, how great a change this last hour 
had made in his feelings. Such a stable, con- 
genial place of refuge he had apparently found ! 
Now, he felt that there was an unknown yet 
real power working against him, and a power 
that would not hesitate to go to extreme 
lengths against him. 

“Thought I had made harbor!” he mur- 
mured and finally fell asleep. It was not an 
easy slumber. He still was burdened with the 
thought that having made a harbor, he was not 
so sure about keeping it. Out he drifted, out, 
out, out ! He was always alone, now clinging 
to a spar, then a plank, then part of a deck- 
house, but ever alone. Finally, he was on a 
cake of ice. Here he had various experiences. 
Occasionally he would slip off and sink into a 
restful slumber. Then he would be on the cake 
of ice again, drifting farther and farther from 
land. After several voyages with intervals of 
slumber, he was on this ice-vessel once more. 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. 187 

Suddenly, a frightful old walrus thrust up its 
head above the edge of the ice and in grim, 
walrus fashion said, “ I am a walrus, ha., ha ! ” 

Then came a bear swimming violently toward 
the ice, splashing savagely through the water. 
Showing its brutal teeth and planting its 
strong, barbarous paws upon the ice, it growled, 
“ I am a bear! ” 

And now advanced a hideous being, with a 
mouth like a whale, and teeth like those of a 
walrus, and huge uplifted hands, half-human, 
terminating in a bear’s paws ! 

“ And I am Cousin Charles ! ” roared this 
last apparition. 

In his fright, Joe sprang out of bed, wildly 
looking behind him. It was a relief not to see 
any phantom there. It was still more of a re- 
lief when he saw a light in the window, not that 
of the moon but of a new day. And hark ! 

He heard a voice singing on the other side of 
a partition. It was Seraph. 

“ David’s harp is a-going. Isn’t that sweet ! ” 
thought Joe. “ That Seraph’s room ? ” 

It was a pleasant conjecture, but he learned 
afterward that he was mistaken. It was a par- 
tition dividing Joe’s room from a long entry. 
Into this entry. Seraph’s room opened. She 
sang all the length of this entry, sweetly. 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


1 88 

clearly, distinctly. For this reason, Joe after- 
wards called this entry “ David’s long harp- 
string.” This was what Seraph sang that 
morning : 

“ Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take ! 

The clouds ye so much dread,” 

Here Seraph’s voice sank, sank away as if she 
were going down a stairway, and this was the 
case. Joe heard these words less and less 
distinctly, 

“Are big — with — mercy — ” fainter, very 
faint — “ and shall — break ” 

“ All gone ! ” exclaimed Joe, who had planted 
one big ear at a small crack in the partition. 
“ Well, I can finish that. No, I’ll sing the whole 
of that.” 

He had a fine voice and had won such fame 
that he had even sung in the church choir at 
home. 

He now in those rich, full, echoing tones for 
which Joe at home and on shipboard also was 
famous, gave the whole verse ; 

“Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take ! 

The clouds ye so much dread 

Are big with mercy — and shall break 
With blessings on your head.” 

Dressing, he went down stairs. 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. 1 89 

“ ril build Seraph’s fire,” he thought. 

The fire had already been kindled. 

** I’ll milk Violet for her,” he then resolved. 

When he entered the barn, he caught the 
sound of a vigorous splashing in a pail. 

“ Oh, is that you, Seraph ? I was going to 
milk for you.” 

“You are very kind, but having begun, I 
think I had better finish.” 

Was that you singing. Seraph?” 

“ Where?” 

“ In the house.” 

“ When ? ” she asked in a wondering tone as 
if she had not sung a note for a century. 

“ Why, only just now, that verse, * God 
moves 

“ Oh, yes. I heard you too. I did not know 
you sang.” 

“ Start it again, and I will sing with you.” 

“ Oh, I couldn’t while milking. You wait till 
I get through.” 

That was a very long milking in Joe’s opin- 
ion. It was through at last. 

“ Now ready. Seraph ? ” 

“Yes,” said Seraph, stepping out from the 
stall, and as she did so, she brushed the hay 
seed from her brown and white calico gown. 
It was a very becoming gown. 


190 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Joe was only human. He had his share of 
vanity and had left the barn-door open, hoping 
Grandma James or somebody else might hear 
the music. Seraph sang three lines, her rich, 
dark eyes twinkling more and more. With the 
word break,” her voice yielded also and she 
stopped. 

“ Oh, I can’t sing that any more. Let us go 
in ! ” 

She did not wait for assent to her sugges- 
tion, but started for the house, walking 
briskly. 

“ Seraph ! ” called the disappointed choir 
boy, resolved to have a little revenge. 

“ What is it?” 

He caught up with her. 

“ Who is Cousin Charles? ” 

Her manner changed at once. It was ab- 
rupt and hurried. Her tone was almost like 
that of a rebuke. 

‘‘ Cousin Charles ? How did you know 
about Cousin Charles? ” 

Should he tell her about the voices that 
came up from the kitchen through that hole 
in the floor? Should he confess to eavesdrop- 
ping? 

Joe who maliciously had put her into a 
corner, was now himself in a corner. He 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. IQI 

appreciated it. He blushed and stammered 
away, 

- I—I—I » 

** Oh, did Percy tell you on board ship? 

‘‘ Ser-ruph ! Ser-ruph ! called out a voice 
from the back door. 

How glad Joe was to hear that voice I 

“Oh, thank you, thank you. Grandma 
James!” thought Joe. “Hurry, hurry!” he 
said aloud. “ Here, Seraph ! Let me take 
your pail ! ” 

Neither of the two young people had a 
chance to resume their conversation about 
Cousin Charles. Breakfast was ready. After 
breakfast. Grandma James said, 

“ Git the Psalter, Seraph ! ” 

After prayers, grandma said, ** Joe, Cousin 
Charles wants some potatoes that belong to 
him, carried into the city. Will you please 
harness Jack into the cart, and take them in ? ” 

If ever two young people were relieved by a 
proposition, the name of one was Seraph James 
and the name of the other, Joe Waters. 

“ Now grandma has previously mentioned 
Cousin Charles to Joe without doubt,” thought 
Seraph. 

“ Seraph will see that her grandmother prob- 
ably dropped Cousin Charles* name in the 


192 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


course of a previous conversation with me," 
thought Joe. 

With alacrity, he replied to Grandma James, 

“ Anything, grandma, anything ! " 

“ Thank you ! ” 

Grandma James saw Seraph staring at her, 
but did not realize that carelessly she had 
mentioned to Joe a name freeing two young 
people from much embarrassment. Joe was 
soon off on his errand. He drove Jack as 
easily and naturally as if Jack had never had 
any other master. His mind though was 
specially upon Cousin Charles. 

“ What would Cousin Charles say if he knew 
I was carrying his potatoes to market ? My, 
wouldn’t he hop ! ” thought Joe. “ He did not 
expect this. Got ahead of him ! ” 

He had overheard Grandma James say to 
Seraph after breakfast, 

“ I suppose Cousin Charles expected me to 
get one of the neighbors to haul in his pota- 
toes, but long as we had such good help as Joe, 
I thought Joe might like it, and then we need 
not trouble our neighbors." 

Seraph nodded her head in assent. 

Before he left on his trip, Joe was told by 
Grandma James that Cousin Charles said there 
were eight bushels of his potatoes, and that if 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. I93 

any of the neighbors took them to town they 
could say to Potts Bros, where they were go- 
ing, ** that there were eight bushels.” 

Joe found the potatoes in a bin down cellar. 
A bushel measure was in the bin. 

“ Now I have got to carry them to the cart 
in something, and I will just take them out in 
this bushel measure and see if Cousin Charles 
has measured right,” resolved Joe. 

** Seven bushels ! ” he said, when he had 
finished. “ That is all ! ” 

As he jogged along to the city, he kept say- 
ing to himself, Shall I turn in my account as 
seven bushels or eight ? I expect the Hohest 
Charles will be mad enough if I turn in seven. 
But I don’t see any other way. Must do the 
square thing ! ” 

** The square thing ” in a trade was one of 
Sidney Waters* maxims. He had his imper- 
fections, and he would sit up in the old shed 
chamber, looking abstractedly out of the win- 
dow upon the shipping in the dock, dreaming 
of great plans for making money, when he 
might have turned the moments to practical 
use by earning something in a humble yet 
available method. But whether he were 
dreaming or waking, playing at the making of 
money or actually earning it, no one ever 
accused him of taking advantage of another. 


194 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


It was ** the square thing ” in money transac 
tions that he aimed at. He cultivated a family 
pride in doing “ the square thing.” 

** There, Joe,” Angel said one day, “Father 
is so constantly impressing the ‘ square thing ’ 
upon us that I expect we have got that mark 
on us somewhere, a complete square. Not a 
circle but a square, stamped right on us.” 

“ I hope it is on your habits,” promptly and 
proudly remarked Mrs. Waters to Joe. 

“ No doubt of it, mother,” said Joe. “ If I 
didn’t do the square thing, I expect father 
would haunt me forever after in my dreams.” 

He felt that he must do the square thing 
now. He knew it would only increase the 
hostility of that mysterious Cousin Charles, 
but he could not help it. 

Once, a voice did make itself heard in his 
thoughts ; “ What do you want to interfere 
for? It is not your business. It is a matter 
between Potts Bros, and Cousin Charles. Let 
them settle it. Keep on the right side of 
Cousin Charles if you can. It may be the 
very thing to get his favor, when he knows it 
was you that took his potatoes to town and 
gave in just the report he wished. You inter- 
fere in what really does not concern you, and 
it will be the very thing to bring down his 
vengeance.” 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. I95 

“ Now that was Mr. Policy giving that opin- 
ion,” said Joe. Shan’t listen to it ! Must do 
‘ the square thing,’ no matter what comes. 
Father said when I was leaving home, ‘ Honest, 
boy ! ’ ” 

Jack jogged along, Joe and the potatoes go- 
ing with him. 

As he neared the city. Jack was walking 
slowly over a piece of uneven road. 

** Hark ! What is that ? ” said Joe. 

Two boys were seated by the roadside quar- 
relling over some object hidden from Joe. One 
of them rose up, and, utterly forgetful that any- 
body heard him, swore furiously at his com- 
panion. 

** That is dreadful ! ” declared Joe, shouting 
“ Whoa ! ” to Jack. 

The horse stopped. The little blasphemer 
catching Joe’s shout to Jack, looked up and 
stopped swearing. 

“ Is that right ? ” asked Joe. 

The boy on the ground dropped his head as 
if ashamed to be seen in the company of a 
swearer. The latter at first stared angrily and 
rudely at Joe. 

** What have you got to do with it ? It isn’t 
your swear ! ” said the boy. 

** I am glad it isn’t my swear. I should cer- 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


196 

tainly be ashamed of it out on the street 
especially, and ashamed anywhere.” 

The boy turned away but remained silent. 

“You ought to think enough of your best 
Friend to use His name differently.” 

“ Whose Friend ? ” said the boy surlily. 

“Yours.” 

“ But who is it?” 

“ God.” 

The boy said nothing to this. 

“You think it over. Never do it again. 
Bite your tongue off first ” 

Joe started up his horse. 

“ That is a good bit of advice. I hope he 
will profit by it,” said a voice. 

Joe turned toward the voice and saw a po- 
liceman who had come up unobserved. The 
two boys moved off into the yard of a house 
near by. 

“ Oh, they have gone, have they ? ” 

“ Yes,” said the policeman, coming up to Joe’s 
wagon. “ What you said will do good. Got 
some potatoes to sell ? How many have you ? ” 

“ I have some to deliver. I rather think 
they are sold. How many? The man who 
owned them gave the number as eight bushels. 
I don’t find them over seven. Somebody’s 
measure didn’t hit the mark, did it ? ” 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES, igj 

“ No,” said the policeman, moving off to 
resume his beat, “but whoever made a mis- 
take, will have to bear it and be more careful 
next time.” 

“Mistake?” thought Joe as Jack jogged 
on. “ Wonder if Cousin Charles made just a 
mistake ! It will be fair to give him the bene- 
fit of the doubt. I can say to Potts Bros., 
that Cousin Charles might have made a mis- 
take. Got to do the square thing any way. 
Get up there. Jack ! ” 

When Joe entered the business quarters of 
St. Johns, he looked about for Potts Bros. 

“ Where, where is Potts Bros.?” he queried. 
“ I forget what the old lady did say about 
their place of business. I will inquire of that 
man on the sidewalk. Why, if that isn’t Sam 
Peters of the old Ann Batten ? ” 

He reined in his horse and shouted cordially, 
“ Sam, how are ye ! ” 

But Sam did not return as cordial a recogni- 
tion. He just moved his head and coolly 
stared. 

“ Doesn’t want to remember the time when 
I pulled him out of the water, may be ! ” con- 
cluded Joe. “Well, I will say ‘how d’y do” 
and ask where Potts Bros, may be. 

“ Sam,” said Joe, driving up to the side- 


198 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


walk and holding out his hand, ‘‘you feeling 
pretty well ? Good to see anybody from the 
Ann Batten ! How are ye ? ” 

Sam though did not extend his hand and 
grunted, “ Fair to middlin’.’' 

“ Any news ? ” 

Sam made no reply. 

“ I’ll pump you, or try to, once more,” said 
the social Joe to himself. “Do you know 
where Potts Bros, keep ? ” 

If Sam had been a turtle, he could not have 
shown to Joe a more unresponsive shell. Joe 
tried Sam once more. 

“ Got a chance anywhere, Sam ? ” 

Sam now executed a pantomime. He jerked 
his head sidewise, thus indicating some con- 
nection with the establishment in the rear of 
the sidewalk. 

“ Well, good-bye and good luck ! ” said the 
not easily discouraged Joe, resolved he would 
not be Pig No. Two because Sam was Pig No. 
One. As Joe’s team rattled away, Joe 
turned to look at the store of which Sam 
Peters had become a part. 

“The very place!” asserted Joe. “Yes, 
sir, the very place where I got hold of Henry 
Haven, and where I wouldn’t stop to sell rum ! 
Rather dig first! I understand now. I expect 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. I99 

I am not in favor there, and Sam Peters sides 
with them. He probably knows all about my 
resignation of a chance there.” Joe’s diag- 
nosis of the case was correct. 

The proprietor of the store soon appeared, 
and Sam Peters reported to him that he had 
seen Joe. 

“ What was that saint doing ? ” asked Cap- 
tain Hartwell. 

“ A-peddlin’ taters, I thought.” 

‘‘ Did he have any with him ? ” 

** Had a lot in a cart, cap’n.” 

** Did he offer you any ? ” 

‘‘ No, I wouldn’t have bought any of ’em if 
he had.” 

“ Did he say where he was a-goin’ ? ” 

‘‘Yes, but I forgot the place.” 

“ Indeed ! He don’t like my place, I know.” 

The captain broke out in a few minutes into 
a rough remark to the fact that “ that Wat- 
ers boy had been a-forever a-gettin’ under his 
feet and he wouldn’t have it.” 

“ Why don’t you step on him then ? ” asked 
Sam. 

“I will. I haven’t forgotten the time he 
insulted me up in Greenland, and he has in- 
sulted me or my business in this store which is 
the same thing. I will step on him.” 


200 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


But Joe was not at all conscious that he 
was the yielding worm under Capt. Hartwell’s 
foot. He rode along, whistling cheerily, now 
and then making inquiries of people in the 
street or examining signs of stores. 

“Ah, there is Potts Bros.’!” exclaimed Joe. 
“ Sort of shipping merchants ! ” 

He leaped down from his seat, and reported 
his arrival to Potts Senior, whom he found 
in his counting-room. 

“ I have some potatoes here from Mrs. 
James’ place, sir. They belong, I think, to her 
cousin ” 

“ Oh, yes ! ” replied Potts Senior, rising. “ I 
am sending off some potatoes to the States, 
and her Cousin Charles wanted to dispose of 
some. How many have you ? ” 

“ Well, sir ! ” replied Joe twirling in his hands 
the old felt hat that had seen the defeat of 
more than one whale. He hesitated one 
moment and heard his father say, “ Honest, 
boy, honest.” “ Well, sir, I thought I would 
say that they were given to me for eight 
bushels, but on measuring them, I find only 
seven. Mrs. James’ cousin might have made 
some mistake, for you know it is easy. I 
thought I would report the case just as it 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. 201 


“ Oh, yes ! That is always the best way, the 
only way in fact.’' 

“ My father brought me up that way, sir.” 

** Where were you brought up, let me ask ? ” 

“ In the States. My name is Waters.” 

** Ah, indeed ! ” 

“ I came here in a whaler, the Ann Batten, 
and she has been sold ” 

** I remember such a sale.” 

And some of us are waiting for a chance 
to ship on a vessel going home and ” 

** I see, I see ! ” 

There was silence now. As Potts Senior de- 
lared that he ** saw,” there was nothing more to 
be seen, nothing more to be said or done, and 
Joe left. 

“ I wish he had said, * no chance this time but 
I’ll give you a chance home’,” Joe said to himself 
as he mounted his cart and drove toward the 
home of Grandma James. He was somewhat 
disappointed, but Joe Waters never stayed de- 
pressed a long time, and he was soon whistling 
again. 

Father,” said a boy turning into the store 
of Potts Bros, as Joe turned out, “father, 
what did he want ? ” 

“That young fellow? Oh, he brought some 
potatoes, and I am sure I don’t know whether 
he brought eight or seven bushels,” 


202 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


“ Why not, father ? ’ 

“ He made out the measure seven, and the 
man who sent them said eight.” 

“ I think he must be right, that big boy 
must.” 

Why so ? ” 

“ Another boy was out playing with me and 
that other boy swore at me all up and down 
and this big boy with the potatoes stopped 
him and wouldn’t let him swear and talked to 
him real good about it. I think that big boy’s 
measure is right.” 

So, so ! That is interesting. I wonder 
who that young man is ! However, I will 
have the potatoes measured ! John ! ” he here 
called aloud. 

“ What, sir ! ” replied burly John. 

“ Give me the number of bushels in that lot of 
potatoes just brought ! ” 

“ Aye, aye, sir ! ” 

He had reported “ only seven,” when a man 
bustled into the store, saying, “ Potatoes 
come ? ” 

“ Oh, Charles, that you ? ” 

Cousin Charles nodded his head. 

“ What do you want to know about the po- 
tatoes ? ” 

I sent these that I see here, these here,” 


THE MYSTERIOUS COUSIN CHARLES. 203 

and as he spoke, he kicked the deficient pile. 
‘‘ I can tell them.” 

Of course ! ” 

** Eight bushels, sir. I believe you can trust 
me to measure them.” 

Yes sir, but the young fellow who brought 
them, reports seven.” 

‘‘What, sir?” 

“ Seven ! Said you might have made a 
mistake. Very reasonable young fellow. I 
liked him. He said his name was Waters. 
Oh, all right ! He thought it was just an un- 
intentional mistake of course.” 

“ Oh, he is an arch deceiver, sir ! Don’t 
believe him ! Don’t take his word ! ” 

“ I am not taking just his word for it. I 
have had the potatoes measured and there are 
only seven bushels.” 

“ What, sir? ” 

“ Seven, sir ! ” 

Cousin Charles had been growing very red 
in the face. He now stammered out some 
kind of a defense, thought it was eight, might 
have been mistaken, but 

He looked up with a sudden expression of 
relief in his face. 

“ It is my opinion, Mr. Potts, he started with 
eight bushels as I said, for it is impossible that 


204 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


I measured wrong. On his way though, he 
must have peddled out a bushel ! Yes, sir! 
No doubt of it ! He sold that other bushel to 
some family on the way, some poor people 
wanting potatoes. Yes, sir ! ” 

“ May be,” said Mr. Potts with an air of un- 
belief in Cousin Charles’ theory, ** but I should 
want to be very sure I was right before charg- 
ing him with doing wrong.” 

“No doubt, sir ! That is his character peo- 
ple tell me who have known him. A deceiver, 
a fraud, an impostor. Yes, sir, and I can 
prove it.” 

Having cleared himself, as he thought, in 
this ingenious way as well as a triumphant one, 
he left the store. 

Potts Senior watched his receding form and 
said, “ I don’t believe any of that nonsense. 
The young fellow appears anything but such 
a cheat.” 

The man whom he watched. Cousin Charles, 
was mumbling over this threat : 

“ I — I — I’ll make him suffer for this ! Got 
me into a tight corner there at Potts Bros. 
Nothing but a quick hop saved me! Only 
my brains helped me that time. I’ll give it 
to him ! 


CHAPTER XIV. 


ONE SUNDAY, AT CHURCH. 

H e came out of the old church door and 
looked up at the sky. He had an air of 
great importance. He gave a look to the 
right and a look to the left, and then he swept 
the horizon with a keen, searching gaze as if 
everything depended on what he saw, the suc- 
cess of the services that day, the size of the con- 
gregation, the presence of certain old men and 
certain old women, the attendance of certain 
semi-invalids. 

^‘Gwine’to be fair! Dat am shuah ! Yah, 
dat am shuah ! ” he exclaimed. Then he went 
into the church, his dark, honest face shining 
with a sense of deep satisfaction. 

He was the new sexton and just what he was 
to do, he hardly knew. “ Tse got it open. 
I know dat! What else ?” he queried. Don’ 
want to sweep dis mornin’ an’ raise dis yer dus’ 
fur de congregation ! Lemme see ! ” 

He could but wish that the inside perform- 


2o6 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


ance of possible duties might be as easy as 
the outside examination of the sky. There 
would be an excellent turn out that day, a 
good sized congregation, and they would all 
see the performance of the new sexton. Then 
the thought, that in return for his kindly ex- 
amination of the sky in their behalf they might 
bestow all kinds of criticisms on him, rather 
chilled his warm old heart. But he was not 
going to allow this to trouble him. He was 
the new sexton. He had found something 
to do. Every day he had “ gwine roun’ ” try- 
ing to hunt up a job, and now he had found 
one. He purposed to rejoice over the fact. 
He felt as if he had got home, into his right 
place, that of a man with a definite calling, 
with an occupation, and he was going to enjoy 
the feeling. He hardly knew and did not know 
what to do, for one officer of the parish had 
hired him and supposed another officer would 
give the new sexton his instructions, and the 
second man did not turn up to say a word 
to the new sexton about his duties. However, 
he was happy. He hummed fragments of 
church tunes. He fluttered like a big black 
butterfly among the pews, lifting the cushions 
and then vigorously dropping them, as if he 
were shaking into wakefulness some of the usual 


ONE SUNDAY, AT CHURCH. 20/ 

church sleepers. He made orderly little heaps 
of the prayer-books in the pews. Finally, he 
concluded he had done everything incumbent 
on a new sexton without an instructor, when 
he chanced to spy a door leading into a little 
room set apart for the clergyman. He bobbed 
into it and then looked about him. Nuffin’ 
to be done in here ! ” he soliloquized. “ Jes’ set 
down a minit’ an’ try one ob dese yer cheers ! ” 

A person may tire himself doing nothing, 
simply fluttering round in an aimless way and 
puttering over trifles. Life without an aim 
but on the hop, will get to be as wearied 
as life with a mission, and it may think itself 
as useful. The new sexton began to feel tired. 
He closed his eyes one happy little moment, 

did it a second time, a third, and soon went 

to sleep. 

Grandma James could not go to church that 
Sunday. 

** My head is aching too hard, children,” she 
said. “ You must go without me.” 

It was an honest ache, not one manufactured 
for the occasion and brought out in season to 
meet the church hour. 

Joe on the other hand, felt something 
coming on.” He could hardly say what it was. 
There was an unaccountable weight to his legs 


208 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


and they did not seem inclined to leave the 
open fire so attractive this chill autumn morn- 
ing. 

“ Seraph, if you will excuse me, I don't know 
as I will go to church this morning,” he said. 

“ Are you sick ? ” 

** Eh — n — no ! ” 

“ Oh, I would go.” 

“ I’m a stranger, and ” 

“ Well, go and get a welcome. I will give 
you one.” 

“ That sounds like my sister Angel. She 
is one of the cordial kind. I will go some other 
time.” 

I would go, to-day. That may start some- 
body else. Go for example’s sake. It may 
start out some other person.” 

“ You think so really? ” 

** Of course ! ” 

The idea interested Joe. He declared, ** Well, 
we will see. I will go.” 

‘‘And go — for — your — own — sake. ” 

Seraph said these words slowly. He made 
no reply. 

Joe and Seraph started off in an old-fash- 
ioned vehicle, and their fresh young faces in the 
midst of such antiquity seemed like cherry 
bloom in brown and withered November. 


ONE SUNDAY, AT CHURCH. 20g 

When they reached the church, Joe inquired, 
‘‘ Where is the cross Percy told about up in 
Greenland ? He said there was one at home." 

“ That is it, may be,’* said Seraph, pointing 
at one with her well-shaped, tapering finger. 

“ Percy said a good deal about it, and I am 
glad to see it." 

“ Don’t I wish he could see it now I We 
know he got to the other side all right, and 
the captain and crew have got here. I hope 
he will come before long." 

“ His vessel sold ? " 

‘‘Yes. The men had to come home by 
steamer. Percy wanted for some reason to put 
off coming, the captain said. Now we will go 
into the church. “ I — I — I — am one " — her 
tongue had a modest trip to it , — ** to see that 
things in the choir are all right." 

It was a pleasant sight, to see Seraph flitting 
about the choir-seats. She set everything in 
order and did it with an air of satisfaction and 
delight. She had a very reverent nature, and 
Joe was continually comparing her with his 
sister, Angel, whom he regarded as the very em- 
bodiment of goodness. They were very differ- 
ent though. Angel was expression itself. She 
could keep a secret, but she did not enjoy the 
process. She was very demonstrative, showing 


210 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


at once the present feeling in her heart. Ser- 
aph could not let herself out of her natural 
reserve so easily. She was very quiet, as a rule, 
and it was a surprise to her on reflection that 
she had unlocked her feelings so readily to 
Joe Waters, and been so very frank and cordial 
on various occasions. She felt that it was a mis- 
take. The difference between the two young 
women was apparent in their religious life. 
Angel’s religion was emotional and Seraph’s 
was contemplative. They both enjoyed music 
exceedingly. If Angel heard music that de- 
lighted her, she would clap her hands and say in 
the most emphatic way, “ Oh, glorious ! ” 
Seraph would be thrilled all over, but the only 
excitable thing would be a vivid light in her 
black eyes. 

Joe was so much interested in watching 
Seraph in the choir that he did not notice an 
arrival in the church. Somebody had .slouched 
into a back seat and then sunk down into a 
corner where the shadows almost hid him. 
This Somebody had previously seen the an- 
cient team bearing Joe and Seraph into town. 
He had been drinking, and was ashamed of 
himself. He felt that it was a sad confession 
of weakness as well as a positive' transgression. 
Because it could be said, ^‘You can’t stop 


ONE SUNDAY, AT CHURCH. 21 1 

drinking,” it was worse than the assertion, 
“ You have been drinking.” 

“Fool, fool!” he kept saying as he wan- 
dered aimlessly along the street. “ When I 
got up this morning and felt the thirst coming 
on, why didn’t I put my foot on the tempta- 
tion ? No, like a fool I gave way to it, and let 
it drive me into town as if I were a helpless 
sheep and here I am ! I feel heart-sick and 
home-sick.” 

Slouching along without a purpose, his 
hands in his pockets, he chanced to look up 
and saw the old chariot coming. 

“Joe Waters! I’m sure of it! And who’s 
that girl with him ? Wonder where Joe is 
going ! ” he said. “ Going to church I know ! 
I have half a mind to follow. Might as well. 
I can get in back somewhere and nobody will 
see me. Yes, half a mind to follow.” 

He soon had a whole mind to follow Joe. 
Jack, the horse, was not a traveler that had an 
intemperate rate of speed, and the man in pur- 
suit managed to keep the horse in sight. 

“ Stopping at that church door ! All right ! 
I will go in too ! ” said the man. 

Soon after Joe’s arrival, there was a second, 
and the last comer drifted into that back 
corner seat like a ship into a secluded dock. 
Joe did not detect the arrival. 


212 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Joe had eyes for Seraph only, who with pure, 
sweet, reverent face went from point to point, 
always with an aim and a result. 

** Feel like a land lubber on board ship. 
Don’t know what I can do,” thought Joe. 
“ Would like to help.’ ’ 

What he witnessed in a little room, looked 
like activity. The door of this room was 
partially open. Through the door-crack, he 
saw legs and a body and the back part of a 
head which was rising and falling with almost 
measured regularity. 

** Seraph ! ” he whispered to the committee 
on duty. “ Man asleep in that room ! ” 

“ Man ? Can’t be the clergyman ? ” 

Yours? ” 

“Yes! I will see.” 

The head of the sexton was still rising and 
falling. After his arduous work, sleep was 
grateful. Then future work might be heavy, 
and sleep was good preparation for it. Was 
not wisdom another name for slumber ? He 
soon was conscious that two faces were look- 
ing at him through a fog, that a hand was laid 
upon him, that a familiar voice was saying, 
“Why, if this isn’t Pompey, our old ship’s 
cook ? ” 

Pompey sprang out of his chair, looked up, 


ONE SUNDAY, AT CHURCH. 213 

stared and confusedly exclaimed, “ Bress us ! 
Dis de minister — beg pardon — I — I — jes’ med- 
itatin’—” 

“ Pompey, don’t you know me ? ” 

“Hoo-ror! Am dat you ? Joey boy ” 

Here the new sexton gripped the hand of 
Joe and he could not have worked it more 
faithfully if it had been a pump-handle on 
board a leaking ship. 

An’ — an’ — dis yer wife, Marse Joe? ” 
“Oh— oh, no ! ” said the blushing Seraph. 
‘‘This is Miss James, sister of Percy, you 

know, Pompey ” 

“ Oh — yah ! I beg pardon ! ” 

The old cook bowed gallantly. 

** Well, Pompey, you the assistant min- 
ister ? ” 

The new sexton showed all his white teeth 
and laughed. 

“ Ise de new sexton ” 

“ How so ! ” 

“ Dunno ! Saw it in de paper an’ spoke 
fur it you see, an’ jes’ walked right in easy as 
de ole whaler into her dock. But make yer- 
self to hum, Marse Joe ! I’m de sexton. 
Dat’s what bring me here. Make yerself to 
hum.” 

Pompey was so tickled because he had laid 


214 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


hold upon one of the duties of sextonship, re- 
ception, that his lips parted wide and his white 
teeth were all on exhibition. 

Joe saw that Seraph looked distressed, and 
he remarked to Pompey, “ Don’t let us keep 
you from your work, and I believe this is the 
clergyman’s room.” 

“ Oh, yah ! Sartin, sartin ! ” said the new 
sexton with a look of responsibility, and he 
gently hustled Joe and Seraph out of the 
room. “ Ise to look arter dis, shuah ! ” 

He was gratified to think he had hit upon a 
second duty of sextonship. 

But he now discovered a third duty and it is 
that test of any worker’s executive qualities, 
the setting of somebody else to work. 

“Joey boy,” he said with exceeding sweet- 
ness, laying a tender hand on the young sailor’s 
shoulder, “ I’se a-gwine to look arter dis yer 
door an’ I’ll hab ye look arter dat.” “ Dis ” 
door was the minister’s ; “ dat ” was that of the 
congregation. In such an impartial division of 
labor Pompey gave another proof of ability to 
discharge well all official duties. 

“ All right ! Seraph, you excuse me. I’ll step 
back to help Pompey,” said Joe amused at Pom- 
pey’s assignment of labor, and yet rather dis- 
appointed to think he could not sit with Seraph. 


ONE SUNDAY, AT CHURCH. 


215 


But whom did he see away back in a dusky 
corner? The assistant sexton neared this re- 
cluse and exclaimed, “You here, Henry Ha- 
ven ? Glad to see you ! ” 

“ I followed you, Joe. I saw you coming 
in. 

Joe smiled, for he thought of the argument 
with which Seraph had induced him to come to 
church. Then he did not smile, for he noticed 
that Henry had been drinking. Saying to him 
that he would soon sit down with him, the as- 
sistant sexton looked at those now entering, to 
learn if any of them wanted assistance in secur- 
ing a seat. They all seemed to be old occu- 
pants of the pews, for without hesitation they 
went to their seats and appeared to be at home 
in them. There was a woman bowed as if old, 
and closely veiled, who entered hesitatingly, 
and advancing a few steps halted. 

“ I will do my duty,” said the assistant sex- 
ton, smiling to think of his assumption of re- 
sponsibility. 

He tapped the old lady on the shoulder, 
bowed courteously and beckoned to her. He 
knew not where to take her. Joe was not one 
though to think of all intermediate steps. 

He stepped boldly up the aisle. No empty 
pew showed itself, and in a pew no one offered 


2i6 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


to make room for the veiled lady. Joe’s heart 
began to fail him. He looked ahead and saw 
Seraph smiling from the choir seats. “ Must 
I take the woman there he wondered. 

Away up in a front pew, a little boy seemed 
to appreciate Joe’s embarrassment, and with- 
drawing into the depths of the pew, made room 
for the worshiper Joe was convoying. 

“There,” thought Joe, bowing the old lady 
in, “ I am glad I have got this craft into harbor.” 

How proudly Joe stepped down the aisle! 
People who saw him whispered, “ That’s the 
new sexton ! ” or “ Isn’t he a success ? ” or 
“A new broom sweeps clean!” or “ Glad 
we’ve got somebody who knows how to do it ! ” 
His walk down the aisle was accompanied by 
compliments he never heard. 

Having won his laurels, Joe thought he 
might not be called to win any more. But 
while he was sitting by the door, his face turned 
away from it, a man came into church and 
stood in the aisle like any stranger desirous of 
a seat. Joe saw only his back and little 
thought he knew him. But when he tried the 
tap he had given the old lady on her shoulder, 
repeated his professional bow and motion with 
the hand, the man turned on Joe swiftly, even 
savagely. 


ONE SUNDAY, AT CHURCH. 21/ 

There was Capt. Hartwell of the George 
Augustus ! ” 

How he stared at Joe ! 

What do you want, young man? Thank 
you to let me alone and not beckon at me like 
a fool ! ” 

Thought — you — wanted — a — seat,” said 
the astonished sub-sexton. 

“ When I need one, I shan’t apply to yoUy 
sir,” said the offended captain. Then he strode 
haughtily, fiercely, up the aisle and walked into 
a pewlabled “ Hartwell.” 

The assistant-sexton was so surprised and 
bewildered that in stepping aside, he almost 
tumbled into a pew, making so much of a racket 
that several epithets like, Blunderbus? ” 
“ That booby of a new sexton ! ” “ Dolt ! ” were 
silently but energetically showered upon him. 

One sea captain growled at him as “ a land- 
lubber,” which would have been very offensive 
to Joe, could he have heard it. If Joe had 
known that Capt. Hartwell was not in his own 
pew but a relative’s, that he rarely came to 
church and was unfavorably regarded, Joe 
would not have felt as if he had meddled with a 
prominent member of the parish. What a com- 
fort to Joe it was when seated beside Henry, 
to look away from his late discomfiture and 


2i8 


A SALT WATER HERO- 


watch the face of Seraph singing up in the choir ! 
Her downcast eyes, her reverent look, a voice 
of unusual richness which Joe fancied was 
Seraph’s contribution to the music, deeply in- 
terested him. 

“ She is an angel ! ” said Joe. ** It does me 
good to look at her.” 

This vision of things in heavenly places 
quieted and comforted him. 

The sermon was hardly quieting, but it in- 
terested J oe very much. For the sake of Henry 
Haven and Capt. Hartwell, Joe listened closely. 
It discussed the power of bad habits. They 
grow on one, like drinking,” shouted the 
preacher. 

** Hope Henry heard that,” Joe reflected. 

One may be in a position like the holding 
of some office and allow himself to cultivate 
habits of tyranny, to browbeat and insult those 
below him,” again vociferated the preacher. 
“ How hard for others ! How mischievous for 
the officer.” 

‘‘ A shot at Capt. Hartwell!” thought Joe. 
“ I don’t know when I have enjoyed a sermon 
more. Right to the point !” 

“ I repeat it,” said the preacher. “ One may 
cultivate tyrannical habits. Oh, how mistaken, 
unjust — ^ — ” 


ONE SUNDAY, AT CHURCH. 219 

“ Pile on the adjectives ! ” thought Joe. 

More shot for that Hartwell!” 

That Hartwell was asleep, but Joe thought 
of him as awake, and Joe enjoyed the cannon- 
ading. 

After service, Joe wanted to hurry off with 
Seraph that he might discuss the sermon with 
her. Seraph was obliged to remain at a rehearsal, 
and Joe waited for her. At last, she was ready. 
He bade good-bye to Pompey, and hastened 
to the carriage. 

“ Why, there is that old woman with a veil ! 
She is sitting in the team ! ” observed Joe to 
Seraph. “ That’s cool !” 

“ I know it,” said Seraph with a smile. 

They approached the carriage, Joe wonder- 
ing what mystery was behind that veil. 

“ Come, children ! ” said the old lady, lifting 
her veil. “ Ain’t it time to be goin’ home ? ” 

“ Grandma James ! ” exclaimed Joe. “ This 
isn’t you ? ” 

'‘Yes, it is!” said the old lady, laughing. 
“ After you left, my headache left me, and a 
neighbor cornin’ along and bringin’ a fast team 
said he’d give me a lift if I wanted to go.” 

“Where is he?” asked the social Joe who 
wanted to see all the neighbors. 

“ I don’t know,” she answered. “You took 


220 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


me up so far I couldn’t see where he went. I 
was foolish to let you go with me, but you 
were so perlite, and then I couldn’t seem to 
get my bearin’s and find my pew, the veil I 
wore hinderin’ me, and ’fore I knowed it, you 
had marched me up to the front. I thought I 
wouldn’t say nothin’. It isn’t every day an 
old woman receives so much attention.” 

The carriage-wheels made a furious rattling, 
but the sound could not drown that of the 
laughter of the party. Then Joe told them 
about Henry Haven, that he hoped the ser- 
mon would do Henry good. 

“Where was he a-settin’?” asked the old 
lady. And how did he like the sermon ?” 

“ Back by the door, and I didn’t have a 
chance to say what I wanted. He seemed to 
want to hurry off.” 

“What is his trouble?” asked Grandma 
James. 

“ Poor fellow ! He can’t let drink alone.” 

“ There he is ! ” remarked Seraph. 

Looking ahead, they saw Henry Haven 
trudging along the road. 

“ I have half a mind to get out and see how 
Henry liked that sermon,” said Joe. 

“ I would,” said Seraph encouragingly. 
“You may say something that will help him. 


ONE SUNDAY, AT CHURCH. 


221 


We will drive along slowly, and we can pick 
you up again.” 

He lives on a farm about half a mile be- 
yond here.” 

“ You can say it in half a mile, can’t you, 
Joe?” 

“Oh yes. Seraph!” 

‘‘ We will pick you up.” 

Joe alighted, and then walked with Henry. 

“ How did you like the sermon, Henry?” 

“ Eh — eh — very well.” 

“ He gave some good advice, didn’t he ?^’ 

“ Oh yes.” 

There was silence for a minute. 

“ Joe, I wish I was home.” 

Henry said this in a mournful tone of voice. 

“ He feels touched, I know. He wants to 
do better,” thought Joe. “ I’ll say something 
to him.” 

“ Henry!” 

“ What, Joe? ” 

Henry’s eyes were fastened on Joe in a very 
direct look. 

“ You know, Henry, that sermon said some- 
thing about drinking ? 

Henry nodded his head. 

“Well, can’t you give it up? ” 

“ I — I — want to.” 


222 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


** Did you ever sign the pledge? ” 

‘‘ No, I never did. I don’t believe it would 
do any good.” 

“You might try it. That sermon showed what 
a power drink will get over one. Terrible ! ” 
Henry said nothing. 

“ It does a lot of harm. Takes from a man 
his money and his morals, just everything. 
How was it you got started this morning ?” 

“ It started itself.” 

Henry spoke sullenly. 

“ That is it. That is another effect of 
drinking, and the sermon showed that. Thirst 
becomes a habit, a fearful one. Really, I’d 

quit it. That sermon ” 

Henry turned and again gave Joe a very 
direct, penetrating look. 

“ See here, Joe ! ” 

“What is it, Henry?” 

“I’ll make you a proposition. But first, 
don’t you think there was something in that 
sermon iox you ? I know there was something 
for me. God knows it too. Oh, how I have 
wanted to be a different man ! But wasn’t 
there something ior you f ” 

“ Why — why, yes — I dare say so. Of course 
there must have been, but I don’t exactly re- 
member now.” 


ONE SUNDAY, AT CHURCH. 


223 


“ That sermon went down so deep into my 
soul I can seem to remember every word of it. 
He hit me in another place. Perhaps he hit 
you. He said we might get into a habit of 
putting off religion, putting off its claims, not 

deciding, you know ” 

“ Oh, oh — yes — I remember! ” 

The two trudged along together several 
minutes in silence. The sky was now lower- 
ing. The winds stirred the ragged foliage of 
an old oak near them, and every dried, with- 
ered leaf shook nervously and rustled in the 
breeze. Some old crows cawed dismally. 

Storm coming! ” remarked Joe, who was 
glad to recognize any kind of a chance for 
changing the subject. 

Henry nodded, and then halting opposite a 
farm-house by the road-side, made a “ prop- 
osition ” : Joe, I must turn in here, you 
know. This is my place. I — I thank you for 
your kindness. Fact is, because you kindly 
determined not to engage here, that is why I 
got a chance. I don’t forget it, and I feel all 
that you meant in kindness. It sort of touched 
me and hurt me the way you spoke and the way 
you put my duty, as if that sermon didn’t give 
you anything to do. This is my proposition ; 
if you will carry out what belongs to you. I’ll 
do the same with my share.” 


224 A SALT WATER HERO. 

When the carriage came up, Grandma James 
asked, “ What success ? ” 

“Well, I — I don’t know,” said Joe, and 
thereupon he fell into a deeply thoughtful 
mood. His companions were bright enough 
to observe it, and also had tact enough not to 
disturb it. 

“ Guess, Seraph, he got more than he was 
a-lookin’ for when he talked with that man,” 
observed Grandma James at the end of the 
ride, when they were alone. 

“Yes,” said Seraph, “ he is thinking.” 

Joe kept on thinking through the day. Hen- 
ry’s words persisted in coming back to him. 

When Joe went to his room at night, he 
was thinking. He heard the rain tap on the 
windows. It made him think of that lonely 
place in the road where he remarked to Henry 
that a storm was coming. 

He recalled the sermon. Oh, in what a self- 
satisfied way he had listened to it and all in 
behalf of other people ! He thought too that 
in just that self-satisfied spirit he must have 
addressed Henry. It was the Pharisee rebuk- 
ing the Publican. 

“ Henry noticed it and didn’t like it,” thought 
Joe. 

He seemed to hear again that old oak rat- 


ONE SUNDAY, AT CHURCH. ^2$ 

tling its dead leaves, as the storm gathered. ** I 
am just a mass of dead leaves,” he said. “ I can’t 
hear anything but just those old leaves rat- 
tling. All I can hear in the house, is that 
rattling.” 

There was another sound about the house 
that night. It was the low tone of a girl on 
her knees praying. It was Seraph in heav- 
enly places indeed. Seraph on her knees, pray- 
ing for Joe Waters. 


CHAPTER XV. 


A ROBBER IN THE NIGHT. 

W HAT is there about a fire that is going 
out which yet inclines people to talk 
on ? Whatever the reason, certainly one 
night before the dying fire on the big, open 
hearth, Joe and Grandma James had a very pro- 
racted talk. Seraph that evening was afflicted 
with a headache and had gone upstairs early. 
Joe had told the old lady that his home in the 
States was at Shipton. 

Shipton ! ” said Grandma James. ‘‘My 
father and mother were buried about five 
miles from there. We somehow feel attached 
to the place where our folks have been buried. 
I have often thought I would like to live again 
in the States. 

“Why don’t you make a move there? It 

would be nice to have you — there ” 

He wanted to say “ you and Percy and 
Seraph,” but he limited his desire to two 
persons, “you — and Percy.” Grandma filled 


A ROBBER IN THE NIGHT. 22/ 

the gap for him. “Yes, and Seraph would like 
to live there.” 

“Well, I’d go certainly,” advised the de- 
lighted Joe. “Haven’t you relatives therein 
that part of the country, grandma? ” 

“ All dead or gone away, that is, of the near 
ones.” 

“ Can’t you think of any acquaintance ? ” 

She shook her head. “ Too far back, and 
they must be gone, or let me see ! I have 
sometimes thought since I have been here of 
my school-mates, and one was a little boy by 
your name.” 

“ Waters ? ” 

“ Yes, but I can’t git hold of the first name.” 

“ Sidney ? ” 

“ It does sound dreadful like that. I was 
one of the very big gals, and he was a very 
little chap with curly hair. He took quite a 
shine to me. Oh, I was fifteen years older, 
most twenty-one, and he was only five. Only 
it was not in Shipton if you mean that.” 

“ My father’s name is Sidney, but I don’t 
know as he ever went to school outside of Ship- 
ton. I might ask him.” 

“You might ask him if he ever went to 
school with a big gal who wore blue hair rib- 
bons, Amanday Trefethen.” 


228 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


“Well, I will. ’Twould be funny if he were 
the boy. Now can’t you think of any, any 
relative, a distant one ? ” 

“ I had a second cousin in Shipton, a Ransom 
Oliver.” 

“ Ransom Oliver ? He — he is our town- 
clerk. Now you will have to go there.” 

The old lady smiled. “ I’d like to see Ran- 
som and live near him. It would seem social. 
It is quite lonesome here at times.” 

“ Yes,” said Joe, and for Seraph. Tthought 
it was homelike very, but I don’t know on 
the whole. I should want more neighbors.” 

It was surprising when Joe thought of a 
possible James-home in Shipton, how little like 
a domestic refuge this Newfoundland one did 
seem. He wondered how it ever could have 
been homelike. 

“ But — Percy? ” he added. 

“ Oh, Percy would like it much. He wants 
to move where it is more lively, into our city, 
and he has said he would like to go to the 
States best.” 

“Well, then go!” 

“ But there’s the property, the house and all 
the buildings. If I could turn them into cash! 
But I can’t seem to sell. I have just had every- 
thing reinsured. I told the agent what I 


A ROBBER IN THE NIGHT. 229 

wanted, that I had it insured in his company 
many years, and I wouldn’t go to a new one 
but come to him, I sort of hoped, as he is a 
real estate man, he might return the favor and 
tell me how to sell the house or offer to get a 
customer. But he was short as pie crust, as my 
mother used to say, and when I asked him, he 
didn’t have a word to say.” 

Grandma James was inclined to be very com- 
municative, that night. 

There is another thing that bothers me. 
There is Cousin Charles ! ” 

“Who?” asked Joe, having a growing desire 
to learn about the mysterious cousin. 

** He is not my cousin, but the children’s. 
He thinks he is not too old for Seraph.” 

“What?” said Joe almost rising. “That 
man?” 

“ Sakes ! When did you hear about him ?” 

“ I want to hear about him. I want to know 
who he is.” 

“Oh?” said the grandma discreetly. “He 
is only a cousin. Now, I was foolish enough to 
git some money from him, only three hundred 
dollars, or somewhat over sixty pounds in Eng- 
lish money. He takes his interest in stuff I 
raise, potatoes and soon. If I could sell the 
place, I could pay him off. As it is, he sort of 


230 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


bothers me. He wants me to make my will 
and make him executor and have him appointed 
sort of guardian to the children ” 

“ I wouldn’t consent to any such arrange- 
ment,” said Joe fiercely. 

“ Percy won’t hear to it, at all. Seraph thinks 
— for she is cute at guessin’ — Cousin Charles is 
a pressin’ me on purpose to do it before Percy 
comes home.” 

“ Oh, I dare say! No doubt of it ! Don’t 
you do it though. I’d move to Shipton.” 

“ But the house? ” 

She rose as if to go to her room. ** There 
will be some way to fix that,” said Joe. ‘T’ll 
take care of it while I am here.” 

This wise counselor and stout defender now 
proceeded to make everything fast, the old 
lady saying, Good-night,” and taking a can- 
dle with her. Then she came back. Oh, we 
haven’t had prayers,” said Grandma James. 
“ I will git you to read. You can begin where 
Seraph left off, last time.” 

Seraph had left off at this place : Where- 
withal shall a young man cleanse his way ? ” 

It seemed to Joe as if these and the after- 
words were burnt into his memory. 

By taking heed thereto according to Thy 
word ; ” 


A ROBBER IN THE NIGHT. 


231 


“ With my whole heart have I sought Thee,” 

“ O let me not wander from thy command- 
ments ! ” 

Joe could but ask himself if Henry Haven 
had told Seraph to leave off at the above 
place. It seemed too as if Henry must have 
told the old lady to keep Joe at this duty of 
reading, just as long as possible, for the Psalm 
did seem a lengthy one, and the reader contin- 
ued at his office until told to stop. Seraph 
never halted when she read, until directed by 
her grandmother. After prayer, the latter now 
went away. 

Joe then secured doors and windows that 
might need fastening. 

“ That room off the kitchen where I imagine 
grandma keeps any money she has on hand, 
and it is the very room too that I fancied 
Cousin Charles wanted to know about, won’t 
need any visit from me to see if the windows 
are all right. Of course they are ! Grandma 
don’t seem to make any use of it. I saw a 
bed and a bureau in it the other day when the 
door was open, and I saw one window. Of 
course the window is fastened ! ” concluded 
Joe. 

He was not easy in his mind, although say- 
ing, Of course ! ” 


232 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


He went to the room, and holding a candle 
in one hand, with the other gently opened the 
door. Halting at the threshold, he looked in. 

“ Bureau looks all right I Wonder in which 
drawer grandma keeps her money ! It is none 
of my business. Window looks all right ! Un- 
doubtedly it is fastened. It would be a handy 
window to get in. Hark ! ” 

His soliloquy was interrupted by a singular 
sound. He stepped back into the kitchen, 
leaving the door of the little room open. 

It seems to be all right in the kitchen ! ” 
he said. “ Could Grandma have made that 
noise, or did it sound like wheels?” 

He set his candle down on a stand near the 
fire-place. He also seated himself in a com- 
fortable rocking-chair near the stand. 

“ I will just wait a few minutes and see if 
that noise comes again,” thought Joe. “ My 
candle is almost out, isn’t it? I must go up 
stairs pretty quick if I want any good from it. 
Just a minute or two ! ” 

He was so seated that he looked toward the 
open door of the little room. He was tired. 
He had been cutting wood the most of that 
day. As the candle-flame sank, his head began 
to sink also. The flame of Joe’s wakefulness 
was burning low. His heavy eyelids fell. His 


A ROBBER IN THE NIGHT. 233 

thoughts grew drowsy. He gave a sudden 
nod. 

“ Bah ! bah ! ” he said opening his eyes and 
staring at that door of the supposed treasure- 
house. “ I must not go to sleep, oh no. 
Why, my candle is just about out ! Well, I 
will go up stairs in a moment, just a moment ! 
That room is all right/’ 

His head began to droop once more. All 
thought grew confused. His eyes closed. His 
head restfully sank on his breast, and Joe was 
fast asleep. The candle sputtered out a re- 
monstrance, but died of the attempt to awake 
him. An ember snapped on the hearth, as if 
trying to say, “ Danger ! ” All in vain. The 
form by the fire slept on. All life in the ember 
now ceased to make any manifestation. That 
too seemed to have gone to sleep. But Joe’s 
face was turned toward that opened door. In 
the dark, while stupidly asleep he still faced 
that way, stupidly bowing to the door. For 
a while, there was no noise of any stir about 
the old house. Silence everywhere from gar- 
ret to cellar. But hark ! Why did not the 
watchman by the fire listen ? There was a 
noise in the direction of that room with the 
opened door. A person who had laid his hands 
on the window-sash and gently raised it, would 


234 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


have made just such a noise. Then there was 
a little period of waiting. A person on the 
outside striving to climb into the window care- 
fully as possible would have made just such a 
sound as was next heard. One flash of light 
coming sharply, then sweeping across the ceil- 
ing and wholly going out, was the next feature of 
this singular programme. If awake, Joe would 
have said it was a ray from a dark lantern. As 
it was, he made no remark. He did not have 
even a thought. He sat senselessly by the 
fire-place, his hands folded contentedly in his 
lap, his nodding head the only active thing 
about him. His head nodded still toward the 
opened door. The flash came once more and 
then made a circle of light around the top of 
the bureau. There was the sound of a key 
going into a key hole. A drawer was opened 
gently. Whoever it was that pulled out this 
drawer, whether Grandma James or somebody 
else, that person had come to the door and 
looked out into the kitchen. Nothing could 
be seen, but suspicion not confidence was the 
result of the inspection, for the inspector 
reached out a hand and almost closed the 
door. It was not the hand of Grandma James 
thus thrust out. They were not the eyes of 
Grandma James that peered into the darkness. 


A ROBBER IN THE NIGHT. 235 

What if those eyes had discovered Joe Waters ! 
Just then came a slam-m-ni ! The raised 
window had not been propped. As if pro- 
voked because neglected, it had come down 
violently. Such vigor of movement could little 
have been anticipated in a thing so old. The 
noise reached the ears of Joe. 

“Who is firing that pistol?” was his first 
thought, and he promptly sprang upon his 
feet. 

Naturally, he thought next of what he last 
had been thinking about when awake, namely 
that room with its supposed treasure. Any 
sound of trouble might naturally be identified 
with this locality. In the dark, he walked 
toward it. The door was ajar. Through that 
crack in the door, he saw a light. What was 
that ? Had grandma come down to examine 
her treasure ? He pushed the door wide open 
and saw a dark lantern on the bureau throw- 
ing its light down into an opened drawer. Joe 
saw also the form of a man. The latter 
turned, and as he did so, he moved his lantern 
which thus threw its light upon his face. It 
was black as if just from darkest Africa. 

There were two eyes of which Joe caught a 
glance, and these were bright as diamonds. 
One other thing Joe noticed; this man with a 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


236 

black face had a left hand that was black, but 
his right hand was white as Joe’s ! 

That was all Joe saw, for the next instant 
he sprang upon the man and tried to throw 
him, ejaculating, You— villain ! ” Joe had the 
advantage of a better chance to seize his oppo- 
nent, but the latter was superior to Joe in 
strength. There was a fearful uproar in that 
room, Joe shouting “ Give in ! Give in! I’ve 
got ye ! ” while a table was hurled one way, and 
a chair crashed against the wall in the oppo- 
site direction. 

Joe was conscious that the man with his 
greater strength was jamming him close and 
hard against a partition between this room and 
the kitchen. The next moment he was con- 
scious that a heavy blow had been dealt him 
on the head. Then he knew nothing. Into 
an abyss, he sank, and all his ideas sank with 
him. He was down in a dark pit for ten or 
fifteen minutes. Then he felt the gentle inter- 
ference of a hand so full of kindness and pity ! 
It almost seemed as if this hand had a soft, mu- 
sical voice saying : “ I feel for you ! Poor fel- 
low ! ” Soon, Joe could distinguish between 
the hand and the voice. The hand was gently 
stroking a bump on his forehead. The voice 
was sounding above him. It said again, 
“ Poor, poor boy ! ” 


A ROBBER IN THE NIGHT. 237 

The voice was Seraph’s. 

The hand was grandma’s. 

“ That is good ! ” said Joe in low tones. 
‘‘ Thank you ! ” 

** Sakes, he’s a-comin’ to, Seraph ! He is 
alive ! ” 

** I know it. Poor boy! Let me bathe him 
now ! ” Joe felt as if he could stay there forever 
and enjoy the sound of that pitying voice and 
the stroke of the new hand touching him. He 
was curious though as well as appreciative. 

** Where — is that man ? ” he asked. 

“ That buggler ? Cleared out, the villain ! ” 
said grandma emphatically. 

Did — he take any money, grandma ? ’* 

“ He got the wrong drawer.” 

« Good ! ” 

** Did you hear him ? ” 

“ Hear? It sounded like a pistol shot — 
whatever it was that I heard. He found us all 
asleep. I was in the rocking-chair. He woke 
me and I sprang for him.” 

Joe was overwhelmed with praises by his 
attendants. If each word of praise had been a 
strip of plaster for the hero’s head, the applica- 
tion could not have been more soothing and 
grateful. 

“ He won’t find us asleep now,” added the 


238 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


old lady. “ I’ve got a light in every room. 
Wide awake I tell ye !” 

Joe smiled to think how the old home must 
look thus illuminated. 

It did them good to see his amusement. 

“ See him smile ! ” they said. 

“ And what have you got there ? ” asked Joe 
looking at an array on a table. 

“ Got my husband’s grand-sir’s old Queen’s 
arm and his boss pistols. They make a bat- 
tery and they are to give any intruder a wel- 
come.” 

“ Are they loaded, grandma ? ” 

“ N-n-no ! I should be sca’t to load ’em. 
They will scare jist as well as if filled chock 
up to the muzzil.” 

Joe now laughed. 

** See him laugh ! ” they said. 

** Oh, no danger now ! ” he told them. ** Burg- 
lars won’t be likely to come twice, the same 
night.” 

He had shut his eyes, smiling as he thought 
how the house all lighted up must look, and 
also what a reception ‘^grand-sir’s old Queen’s 
arm ” and the “ two hoss pistols ” would give 
one. He went to sleep thinking of Seraph and 
Grandma James as two angels bending over him 
and watching his slumbers. 


A ROBBER IN THE NIGHT. 239 

When he gave any sign of wakefulness, they 
hushed him off to sleep again. 

“ ’Twill do him good,” Grandma James told 
Seraph. “ May save his life.” 

“ That burglar gave him a cruel blow.” 

“ I know it but we will get the better of him.” 

Occasionally they left Joe and went with 
staring eyes and on tip-toe about the house, to 
see that in every room the lights were vigor- 
ously burning. So the old house kept watch 
with vigilant eyes of flame all through the 
night, while in the kitchen two angels in human 
form bent over the sleeping Joe, their eyes as 
watchful as the bright windows that were star- 
ing out into the night. 


CHAPTER XVI. 


THE ARREST. 


RANDMA JAMES went out early the next 



morning to get the air and also to see if 


the hens thoughtfully the day before, had laid 
a few eggs for breakfast. She had flung her 
apron over her head in lieu of a hood, and was 
now running past a big hay stack near the barn. 
Suddenly she stopped. 

“ Massy ! ” she exclaimed, throwing up her 
hands. 

She stood as if chained to the spot. There, 
on the sheltered side of the stack, the hay 
pulled about him and serving as blanket and 
quilt, was a colored man. She did not look 
many times, nor did she go farther to hunt 
up eggs for breakfast. She ran back to the 
house, shut the door and bolted it. Then she 
reported the facts to Joe and his ministering 
angel in the kitchen. 

‘‘ You don’t say, grandma! Now I will just 
step out and look at him,” said Joe. ‘‘ I feel 
firstrate.” 


THE ARREST. 


241 


There was a ready remonstrance from the 
females, but Joe’s eagerness overcame opposi- 
tion. First his forehead was bandaged anew, 
and then he was watched from the back door 
by his two angels, grandma keeping her fire- 
arms near her. 

“Who are you?” exclaimed Joe as he bent 
over the sleeping form leaning against the 
sheltering wall of the haystack. “ The man I 
saw last night had a black face, but this man — 
why, who is it ? ” murmured Joe. “ Wake up ! ” 
he shouted. 

The sleeper smiled, opened his eyes and gave 
a bland, good-natured stare at this young hero 
with a bandage about his forehead. 

“ Ho, Pompey, this you?” shouted Joe. “Yes, 
it is you, I believe. How did you come here ? ” 

The late assistant-sexton was gazing with 
interest upon the face half buried under the 
wisps of hay, and the interest was all repaid. 

“ Honey alibe, dat you, Marse Joe ? Lemme 
git up ! How are ye, honey? Don’ I lookjes 
like ole Pompey ? ” 

“Yes, but what were you doing down here? 
Last time I saw you, you were sexton.” 

“ Oh, dat no go ! Dat Cap’n Hartwell made 
a fuss, sez I didn’ tend to my duty an’ dat you 
’suited him.” 


242 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


** I insulted him ? Never ! ” 

** Ob course not ! He wanted to talk, sez I 
warnt in my place an’ got you to do my work. 
Oh, he made de dus’ fly an’ I hab’ to leabe. I 
jes’ trabel roun’ in de country fur a job. Say, 
Marse Joe ! What de row las’ night ? You lib 
here?” 

‘‘ Yes, I am stopping here. You hear any 
noise ? ” 

“ I came ’long — ” he stopped and looked 
about him as if fearing the presence of an eaves- 
dropper. “ I came ’long here jes’ when it were 
a-growin dark an’ dropped down here to pass 
de night. In de night, I hearn a rackit ! ” 
Here, Pompey revolved two awe-struck orbs. 
‘‘ I wake up an’ see a light jes’ one minute and 
den it were dark as a pockit. Hearn a winder 
drop an’ somebody steal ’way sof’ly, an’ den 
down de road, hearn wheels a-rollin’ away — an’ 
den all gone! Nuffin, but de win’ an’ de ole 
pine tree a-sighin’.” 

** Pompey, the house was entered by some 
rascal or other and he gave me a fearful clip. 
And you heard the noise and somebody a-go- 
ing away ? ” 

“ Jes’ so! If I had fought it was a buggler 
I’d cotcht him, shuah ! De reskil ! ” 

‘‘ Well, he has gone now and he went in some 


THE ARREST. 


243 


kind of a team, did he ? I think he must have 
come that way, and that would explain a strange 
noise I heard before I went to sleep.’* 

“ He gib you a rap on de skull? De ole 
brute ! ” 

** He did all that. It feels stiff, but I shall 
do well. You had any breakfast? Of course, 
you haven’t. And you must be hungry ? ” 

** Oh, summat! Now if ye hab any job an’ 
I could jes’ earn suffin’ fur my breakfus’, I 
should like dat.” 

Oh, I’ll fix that. You hold on here. I’ll 
be back again.” 

Joe stepped over Grandma James’ fire-arms 
which she had planted in the doorway as a 
menace to Pompey if wrongly disposed, and he 
explained who the man under the haystack 
was. 

The two women looked incredulous. 

“ It was a black man you said, last night, Joe.” 

“ A blacked up man. Seraph, I ought to have 
said. Entirely different looking man this one 
is. That feller last night had eyes like live 
coals. Pompey out there is one of the mildest, 
kindest men in the world. Why, grandma, he 
was the cook in the Ann Batten. He cooked 
many a good meal for Percy. He made lots 
of gruel for Percy when he was sick.” 


244 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Joe’s two hearers softened immediately. 

They surely ought to feed the old cook that 
had fried and baked, steeped and stewed, for 
Percy. Joe’s confidence also in the old negro 
affected grandma and Seraph. They received 
him to the warm kitchen, seated him by the 
open fire and fed him. 

Seraph,” said Joe aside, “that poor fellow 
needs thicker clothing and he wants a chance 
to work. I think I can get some clothing for 
him, second hand you know, from some kind 
soul in the neighborhood, and I’ll inquire about 
work. You won’t be afraid to let him stay 
here ? There is some work he might do at the 
wood-pile.” 

“We trusted somebody else who came to 
our wood-pile, and we will give this one a 
chance. I will explain to grandma. You had 
better go at once if you are going, and the 
sooner the better. Then you will get back all 
the quicker.” 

Joe pulled his felt hat down over his bandage 
to prevent the questions that would otherwise 
fly at him like arrows. He was gone longer 
than he intended. It was easier to ask for 
old clothes than to get them. He went two 
miles before he secured a serviceable donation. 
To find a place where Pompey would be em- 


THE ARREST. 


245 


ployed, was still more difficult. Joe traveled 
three miles before he found any encouragement. 

I — ril try your black man for a day or so,” 
said a farmer. 

When Joe though reached again the spot 
where he had left this black man who wanted 
work, the man was gone ! 

“Did you see them? ’’asked Seraph, ex- 
citedly. 

“ See whom ? ” asked Joe . 

“ Oh,” exclaimed Grandma James, “things 
have jest happened right along since you have 
been gone ! Cousin Charles has been here, and 
when he saw Pompey, he took me aside and 
sez ‘ Who is that ? ’ Oh, I told him, that is 
the cook in the whalin’ vessel that Joe Waters 
and Percy were in. I had told him, you see, 
about the robbery here, last night. He was very 
much surprised, very. When I told him the 
man looked like a black, he whispered to me, 
* Watch that Pompey ! Don’t let him go out 
of your sight ! ’ Then he got into his carriage 
and drove off as if mad to the city. What 
should happen next, after a while, but another 
team came out here, and an officer came 
with it. He jest stepped into the house, pulled 
out a warrant for Pompey ’s arrest, charging him 
with breaking into our house ! Poor Pompey ! 


246 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


He went off in the most chop-fallen way. He 
said he was innocent and was all down in the 
mouth. I don’t believe he’s guilty !” 

“ Nor I ! ” said Joe promptly and strongly. 
“ Who had him arrested ? ” 

“ I suppose Cousin Charles.” 

“ Cousin Charles ! ” said Joe contemptuously. 
“ I am going to harness up and drive into the 
city and find out about Pompey.” 

“Poor boy! You will faint away. There 
is your head ! ” 

“The head will stay in its place, I guess. 
You mean the hurt. You just put on a fresh 
bandage and I can pull my hat down over it. 
I am not ashamed of it. I got it in a good 
cause.” Joe would have his way. Then off 
he went at a rapid rate. 

His return was confidently expected after a 
few hours. Instead of that, twilight came and 
no Joe was to be seen. 

“Where is he? ” wondered Grandma James. 

“ He ought to be here,” positively affirmed 
Seraph, “ and I think he will be here.”* 

When after a longer period of waiting a 
sound of rattling wheels was heard and these 
ceased to turn at the door of Grandma James, 
the young man alighting was not Joe Waters. 

“ Mrs. James live here?” he inquired of the 


THE ARREST. 247 

old lady, who had come to the door prepared 
to say, “ We are so glad to see you, Joe ! ” 
Instead of this grandma replied, “ That’s my 
name.” 

I am a shipmate of his, or was. I am Na- 
thaniel Perry. I have brought the team home 
and a message from Joe Waters.” 

“Where is he ?” asked Grandma James eagerly. 

“ I am sorry to say he is under arrest ” 

“ Arrest ! ” said grandma throwing up her 
hands. 

“Yes, madame. I happened to know of it 
because I saw fiim on the street with Pompey 
and an officer. You know he started to hunt 
up Pompey whom an officer arrested out here. 
Well, he drove so fast he overtook them, and 
the officer turned on him, pulled out a warrant 

and had him under arrest at once ” 

“ What for? ” asked Seraph who had come to 
the door, her face growing whiter and whiter. 
“ For stealing a Bible, I think, and a little 

gold anchor pin from Capt. Hartwell ” 

“ Percy gave them to Joe,” said Seraph ener- 
getically. 

“ But Percy is not here to say that. I have 

seen Joe wearing the pin ” 

The captain gave Percy the Bible and the 
pin, and Percy gave them to Joe.” 


248 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


“ Joe says that ? ” 

** Yes.” 

And I believe him, but can he make others 
believe him ? Percy being away, the testimony 
Joe wants in his favor, he can’t get.” 

Oh, dear ! ” groaned Grandma James. 
“ Why don’t Percy come ? He ought to be 
home by this time.” 

Grandma, I am going into the city, if I can 
get somebody to stay with you. I will go to 
one of the neighbors and get help.” 

** You going into the city? ” 

**Yes, grandma, I must. I can get in and 
back in an hour and a half. I will be back.” 

‘‘I was going to say, madame, that Joe 
asked me to bring the team home and said if I 
would stay and guard the castle, he would like 
it, and you might like it, he said. I want to 
see you and get some evidence and ” 

Do stop ! ” pleaded the old lady. “ If 
there should be an attack to-night, I have got 
some — some firearms, but I want a man to 
handle them.” 

In a few minutes, the homestead by the 
roadside looked as undisturbed as if no one had 
visited it for a century. Nat Perry sat by the 
fire within. Through an open door, grandma 
contemplated with satisfaction the old queen’s 


THE ARREST. 


249 


arm and horse pistols out in the entry. The 
team had started for town. Seraph had 
touched up Jack with her whip — gently, for she 
never in her life had thus far given him a hard 
stroke — and Jack was doing his very best at 
traveling, reviving the good record of his 
youth. 

Her thoughts were in a whirl. She recalled a 
visit to the sea within a few months and after a 
storm. She noticed how profoundly the depths 
of the ocean had been stirred, what a tearing 
up and turning over and throwing out there 
had been, things at the bottom coming to the 
surface and then strown along the beach. It 
seemed as if there had been just such a com- 
motion within her soul. •Feelings which she 
supposed had not even existed there, had been 
thrown to the surface of her consciousness and 
now ruled her. This young sailor, what had 
he been to her? A faithful friend to her 
brother and his faithfulness appreciated ; frank, 
genial, generous, courageous, and all these 
good qualities properly valued — that was all. 
No, it was not all, she was learning. They 
were different. He knew he was impetuous, 
and she was calm, though not calm to-night. 
She stopped to think before acting, and he 
went ahead though earthquakes might be rum- 


250 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


bling and volcanoes bursting forth. He looked 
up to and respected her deliberate judgment. 
Then he saw that she was an inhabitant of a 
world that he was outside of. That spiritual 
life she was so familiar with, he was below the 
level of. She to his thought moved among 
saints and angels. He found himself looking 
up to Seraph in many ways, leaning upon her 
judgment in daily things, trusting to her deci- 
sions in the sphere of conscience. Joe very 
much respected the ground on which she 
walked. He also found it necessary to have one 
like Seraph walking on the common earth he 
trod. He was dependent, consciously depend- 
ent on her. Seraph saw it. The grandmother 
realized it and thought it harmless. And Ser- 
aph thought she only appreciated at a fair valu- 
ation this relation of dependence in which 
Joe stood to her. It was not strange that 
there was a little pride, a dash of conceit to 
her estimate of this relation. We all have 
this flaw of conceit in the structure of our char- 
acter. It often happens that when other beings 
are dependent upon us, we become ourselves 
dependent upon them. If they are taken from 
our presence, we may strangely miss the old 
demand upon our sympathies, perhaps upon 
our strength. If the ^.reature leaning upon us 


THE ARREST. 


251 


should like us, it would be quite probable that 
we in turn would have some interest in them 
akin to liking. 

Now, Joe had been abruptly removed from 
Seraph. She missed, as if he had been gone a 
century, that open deference to her judgment, 
that dependence upon her in many ways, and 
oh ! if he should be absent a century, how much 
she would miss this hitherto unrecognized com- 
pliment to her superior wisdom ! Beyond this, 
had she become interested in her dependent 
charge? She did not allow it, but for some 
reason she felt a hurt within. It may be only 
a vine wrapped about an oak, and yet if this 
green garment be torn away suddenly, violently, 
even the bark of the oak will show a bruise. 

In addition to this, to think he an honest, 
generous, broad-minded young man, her friend, 
her charge, should be accused of theft ! Why, 
it almost seemed as if somebody had charged 
guilt upon Seraph James. Her soul rose 
up in a storm of indignation to r pel the 
charge. 

Her cheeks burned with the flame of a just 
wrath. And to think that Cousin Charles 
whom she thoroughly despised should make the 
accusation ! Meanness and littleness and envy 
and stinginess and cruelty making this assault 


252 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


upon a noble heart ! How her soul in all its af- 
fections, powers, resources to-day, hopes to-mor- 
row, moved out toward this young stranger, 
Percy’s friend. Grandma’s friend, her friend, 
and there by his side she took her stand. 
Seraph, the calm, the even -going, did not know 
herself in this hour of tumult. The blood 
flamed hotter in her cheeks. Her arms were 
strong with excitement. Unconsciously she had 
been pressing Jack forward, faster and faster, 
urging him harder and harder, till the creature 
at last was rushing on at a very excited pace. If 
a sudden flush of strong daylight had been 
sent down upon Jack and his driver, no one 
would have easily recognized the horse or Ser- 
aph. But some one in the twilight did recog- 
nize them partially, for a harsh, domineering, 
exasperating voice called out, “That you. 
Seraph?” And with an oath, he demanded 
rather than asked, “ Where are you go- 
ing?” 

If Seraph’s heated face had abruptly re- 
ceived a dash of coldest sea-water, sending the 
blood back upon her heart, the effect could not 
have been more instantaneous or rapid. She 
pulled in the horse at once. She did not ask 
of the person now at the horse’s side, “ That 
you. Cousin Charles ? ” 


THE ARREST. 


253 


She knew it was he. 

‘‘To the city/’ she said coldly, though afire 
with excitement. 

He broke out into the fiercest, angriest tones, 
“ See here ! You are not going to meddle in 
this business and find that young fool ? ” 

“Whom do you mean by young fool?” she 
asked with dignity and sternness, the first qual- 
ity a natural one, but the second not natural. 

He felt the rebuke. He stammered, “That 
f-f-feller — at your house.” 

“ It is a wicked lie, Charles ! ” 

He had now recovered himself. 

“I’ll stop this nonsense. You go home!” 
he commanded. 

“ I shall not.” 

“ If you won’t. I’ll make you.” 

He stepped closer up to the horse, reaching 
out his hand as if to lay it on the horse and 
forcibly detain him. 

“ Don’t you touch that horse ! I — I — warn 
you ! ” 

“ Nonsense ! We will see.” 

His hand now rested on the horse’s back. 

Seraph rose in her seat. She drew back her 
arm, raised her whip, and then as if every mus- 
cle were iron and behind it were a strength 
equal to half-a-dozen horse-power, she brought 


254 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


the whiplash down upon her beloved cousin’s 
arm so smartly, so forcibly, that he howled in 
pain and with a savage oath withdrew his arm. 
Then she gave the horse a cut as hard? No, 
she touched him gently, said, “ Now, Jack, 
spring for it ! ” 

And Jack sprang. The blow that villainous 
Charles received, the horse might have feared 
he would catch the next moment and so he flew 
on. And Seraph standing up urged him to do 
his best. “ Good Jack ! Now go ! ” “ Now, 

boy! now, boy!” Every minute or two, she 
looked back to see if Cousin Charles were chas- 
ing her, for she knew he would attempt it. 
Yes, she could see that he was running. 

Groaning, gnashing his teeth, swearing, 
stroking his arm, he was a copy of the Evil One 
on foot and chasing a poor victim. 

And Seraph’s face now so strong and stern, 
was that of some angel turned toward and fac- 
ing in defiance her persecutor. Suddenly, the 
Evil One tripped over a stone and went sprawl- 
ing in the road, roaring out his hideous blas- 
phemy. Then Seraph’s face lighted up with a 
serene, bright, holy triumph like that of St. 
Michael when he had got his foot on the 
dragon, for Seraph heard the outcry. 

He won’t trouble me any more! I think 


THE ARREST. 25$ 

he has fallen. Now we will go right along, 
dear old Jack ! ” said Seraph, smiling. 

Yes, they went “ right along.” 

Cousin Charles went somewhere else. 

“ She is worse than the Evil One ! ” he 
grumbled. 

Not worse, but stronger. Cousin Charles, even 
as all good is actually stronger than the evil, 
and one day it will be proved so in an ultimate 
and lasting triumph. 


CHAPTER XVII. 

IN HIS CELL. 

HADOWS in the old cell. They were 



black enough any time down in the cor- 


ners and under the hard bed. At twilight 
they seemed to creep out of all secreting nooks, 
to be endowed with vitality, to fasten upon and 
crawl over any occupant. They were an incu- 
bus, even the restless weight that develops into 
a nightmare. 

“ No,” said Joe rising up and shaking him- 
self as if throwing off a burden, ‘‘ no sir ! I 
am not going to give way to this. I am inno- 
cent, and innocent folks have a right to be 
cheerful. I am going to see how he is getting 
along.” 

He went to a little grate, pressed his face 
against the bars, and called out softly and yet 
distinctly, “ Yom—pee / ” 

He listened. 

Dat you, Joe ? What say, honey ? ” came 
a response from the right, a response in deep 
mournful tones. 


In his cell. 


25; 


How are you getting along, Pompey?’’ 

^‘Oh, doin’ de bes’ I ken.” 

‘‘ Don’t worry ! I’ll get you out of this 
scrape. You are as innocent as any chicken.” 

“ De Lor’ knows I be.” 

After this came a big sigh. Then Pompey 
began again. 

“ Ob corse ” 

Somebody here opened a door leading into 
this prison -world, and Joe and Pompey were 
silent. The person went back, and Pompey 
said, “ Good-night, Mars’ Joe ! ” 

** He does not want to talk,” thought Joe, 
“and I won’t make him.” 

He called out, “ Good-night ! All right in 
the morning ! ” 

Then Joe turned back and faced the gather- 
ing, crawling, attacking shadows. 

“ It is not fully dark outside, but it is night 
in here,” he muttered. “ Wonder what they 
are doing at grandma’s ! Nat Perry must be 
there by this time.” 

He could imagine just how it looked in the 
old kitchen. He could see Seraph and Grand- 
ma James. He followed Grandma James as 
she started to do her evening work, and then 
he seemed to hear her say, “ You may get the 
Psalter now. Seraph.” 


258 A SALT WATER HERO. 

It made Joe think of that night when he 
had read the Psalter for grandma. He could 
see himself bending over the book. He could 
hear himself reading : 

“ Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way ? 

By taking heed thereto according to thy word. 

With my whole heart have I sought thee ; 

O let me not wander from thy commandments ! " 

Strange I can remember that so distinctly," 
thought Joe. ** I wonder if Henry Haven has 
done anything about that matter of his drink- 
ing. He — he — had me in a tight place." 

Why should he have you in a tight 
place ? " was the inquiry aroused within him. 
** Why don’t you do your duty irrespective of 
what he does? " 

‘‘I suppose I ought," replied Joe. “Sup- 
posing you know you ought," was the comment 
of the being within, “ now, why don’t you 
do your duty? Why don’t you clean up your 
own path ? Is that the way people do in or- 
dinary matters, to look at other people’s paths 
and make their own no cleaner ? There was a 
certain boy at home famous in winter-time for 
keeping his father’s sidewalk clean and pass- 
able, no matter what neighbors did. Theirs 
looked slovenly enough at times and discour- 


IN HIS CELL. 


259 


aged him and he might easily have been as 
negligent, but he was always particular to look 
after and keep clean and tidy his sidewalk. 
His name was Joe Waters. He is a young 
man now. He ought to have a clean path in 
spiritual things, no matter how dirty Henry 
Haven’s may be. Come, young man, make 
clean your way ! * Cleanse ’ it, as the psalm 

says ! ” 

This last sentence seemed to Joe to be 
given almost in the tones of a shout. The 
being within continued : 

“It is not manly, it is mean to be dodging 
your duty. You ought to be a Christian. 
You ought to bring your life into harmony with 
God’s love. You ought ” 

“ Oh, I know it,” said Joe, and he mournfully 
bowed his head on his hands as he sat upon 
the edge of his rough prison-bed, “ I know it, 
but I am in so much trouble, so much trouble ! 
I am so weak. I — I — ” His pride, his confi- 
dence in his integrity and innocence that had 
been buoying him up, now seemed to leave 
him. He felt lonely, isolated, depressed. He 
thought of those at home, his father, mother, 
Angel. He thought of Seraph. Did any of 
these think of him, wonder where he was, pity 
him, pray for him ? 


26 o 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


He felt weaker and needier. “ Cleanse his 
way ? ” How could he do it ? That way 
grew more and more unsightly, more and more 
unclean. “ Oh, I can’t clean it ! I can’t do 
anything. I am in prison — alone. Who was 
it said ‘ I was in prison, and ye came unto 
me r 

That thought was a little ray of light falling 
into his shadowy cell, and the ray began to ex- 
pand into a beam, and that also widened and 
brightened. 

“Jesus said that, ‘I was in prison and ye 
came unto me.’ And He had lots of pity for 
poor fellows in trouble, always picking them up 
and helping them. He also was the One who 
said, ‘ Come unto me ’ — how does that go ? 
Let me see if I can say it : * Come unto me, 

all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, and I 
will give you rest.’ Can’t seem to get hold of 
the other part of it, but ” 

The light was growing. 

“Why don’t you put your case in His 
hands?” said the being within. “Ever so 
many people have been just where you are, 
feeling very poor and needy, feeling that they 
could not make clean their own way and yet 
it ought to be made clean — and they have told 
Jesus their story and He has helped them — ” 


IN HIS CELL. 


261 


The light had strange growth and beauty 
now. 

“ I will tell Him my story,” murmured Joe, 
put it all in His hands— I can’t do anything 
—I ” 

He dropped down beside his prison-bed, and 
just committed himself with all his sinfulness, 
all his need, all his poverty, loneliness and iso- 
lation of spirit, into the Saviour’s hands, 
tender, compassionate, loving. 

“ That is all I can do,” said Joe as he rose. 
He then lay down on his bed. The shadows 
— no, the light had come. It filled the cell. 
There was a Presence with him, and the Pres- 
ence quieted and helped him. 


CHAPTER XVIII. 


AN ARRIVAL. 

J OE lay awake a little while, and what trav- 
elers were his thoughts ! 

They went across the great sea and reached 
Joe’s home. They stopped there while Joe 
told his father and mother of his new life-pur- 
pose. Then it seemed as if Parson Walton 
might like to know of the new step Joe had 
taken, and those famous travelers hunted 
Parson Walton up. 

The good man was so much gratified that he 
said he felt the way St. Simeon did when he 
wanted permission to depart in peace. 

Joe now came back to his cell. He speedily 
fell into a grateful sleep. Then he began to 
dream. The dream was not an agreeable one 
as it finally began to shape itself in his 
thoughts. The prevailing idea was that of the 
loneliness of imprisonment. He was confined 
in a cell. He had been trying to get some 
comfort out of his Bible, 


AN ARRIVAL. 


263 

Who was that man shut up in prison, and 
soldiers were about him,” inquired the 
dreamer, and an angel came to him ? Oh, St. 
Peter ! We studied about him in the Sunday- 
School, yes, St. Peter. And an angel came 
to him and let him out of prison.” 

An angel coming, an angel letting him out, 
this was the strong, leading impression made 
on Joe’s mind. It was interrupted though by 
a voice calling to him ! 

“A very pleasant voice!” thought the 
dreamer. “ An Angel’s voice ? ” 

The voice trembled. It’s tones were agi- 
tated. The effect was that of a voice strug- 
gling amid obstacles to reach him, like a sun- 
ray trying to work down through a fog and get 
at and rest upon and illumine and warm and 
strengthen a weak, sickly, discouraged plant. 
Joe was the plant. 

“ Joe-0-0 ! ” called the voice. 

He opened his eyes and his ears also. 

Do — answer — me ! You here ? ” pleaded 
the voice. 

Joe sprang from his bed. He rushed to 
the grate in his door. A face was there and it 
looked out of a circle of light. Was it such a 
halo as celestial faces wear ? The next mo- 
ment, he saw that the light came from a lamp 
outside. This disappointment was very tran- 


264 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


sient, for the face itself was one he had rather 
see than that of any angel between the earth 
and the distant star, Sirius. 

Seraph, that you ? You are real good ! ” 

He reached up a hand, and slipped it be- 
tween the bars. A hand not of an angel but 
one of flesh and blood, warm, sympathetic, 
cordial, grasped his hand, and Joe knew at once 
what it meant. She believes in me ! She 
won’t leave me,” was the conviction strength- 
ening and filling his soul. 

“ Yes, just to tell you that I believe in 
you ” 

Another shake of the hand. 

And I am going to have you out of this 
place, though I suppose I can't bail you out 
till to-morrow ” 

“ It will make you too much trouble.” 

“ Trouble ! Poor fellow, what about yours ? 
No, sir, if I can do anything, it shall be done.” 

Another hand-shake. 

“You are real good. Seraph. It will come 
out right.” 

“ Wi// come ? It has come, in my opinion, 
and is right. Nothing can be proved against 
you.” 

“ Good ! I am glad you think so.” 

“Oh, if Percy would come! Just a word 
from him would settle it all.” 



JOE KNEW AT ONCE WHAT IT MEANT. 


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AN ARRIVAL. 


265 


** When do you think he will come ?” 

** He ought to come any time. Now — 
dear ” 

Did she say dear ” ? 

Joe did want to hear that word -again. 

“ Now — I — must be going. Oh, are you 
comfortable in there ? ” 

“ I am now and shall be. I don’t care now 
if my bed is tougher than a thousand year old 
ledge off in the Atlantic. 

Don’t worry! To-morrow will soon be 
here. Good-bye!” 

A prolonged hand-shake. 

He could not let her go. 

Oh, is grandma ” 

** She is well. She is sorry, and thinks it is 
dreadful to torment you so. She is your friend 

and thinks as I do ” 

** And Nat got there ? ” 

** Yes — yes — and he stays to-night. He will 
be in to-morrow. All your friends will come. 
I shall tell every one. I must go,” 

You are too good. Could you say one word 

to poor Pompey ” 

‘‘ I will, I will. Good-night ! ” 

“ Good night, dear ! ” said Joe and spoke with 
double emphasis as if speaking for her and for 
himself. 


CHAPTER XIX.^ 


HIS OWN STORY. 


ATHER! Father!” screamed Angel 



Waters in the direction of the chamber 


over the wood-shed. 

Then she ran to the foot of the stairway 
leading to her mother’s chamber. 

“ Mother ! Mother ! ” she cried. 

She flew to the front door and putting out 
her prettily shaped head, called emphatically 
to the children playing on the sidewalk, 
“ Sammy ! Kittie ! ” 

They all flocked into the kitchen, asking 
solicitously, What is the matter?” 

** I went — to the — Post-Office and here’s — 
a letter from our own Joe! Now open your 
ears everybody, and I’ll read it.” 

One might have thought that Angel said, 
“open your eyes,” for they all stared at the 
fair reader. She began. 


HIS OWN STORY. 267 

** ‘ St. John’s, Newfoundland, Oct. 15th, 18- 
“ * Dear Folks, 

“ ‘ A lot has happened since I last 
wrote. What would you say, father, if anybody 
should charge your son with being a thief and 
unjustly imprison him ’ ” 

** Now that is outrageous ! ” exclaimed Sid- 
ney Waters, bouncing up from his chair. 
“ Where is our consul from this country and — 
I’ll complain ” 

** Father, you hold on ! Guess our Joe can 
take care of himself,” said Angel. “ May be, 
he is supposing a case.” 

** Yes, yes,” came in a chorus from the 
others. 

“ Don’t be impatient,” chidingly remarked 
Mrs. Waters. 

The father subsided, but his eyes glared and 
he showed that he was ready to make another 
spring out of his chair. 

Angel continued ; 

“ ‘ You have heard me speak of Percy James 
who was a boy on board an English whaler 
commanded by Capt. Hartwell. Percy gave 
me a Bible and a gold anchor pin which he 
said Capt. Hartwell gave him. I did not want 
to take them, but you know there are some 


268 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


people who somehow can make you take a gift 

of money and such things ’ ” 

Sidney Waters wished he knew of some 
such people. ‘‘ Dreadful scarce this way ! ’* he 
thought. 

Then* said Joe, * I have written about 
a mysterious Cousin Charles here in Newfound- 
land, and what do you think ? Cousin Charles 
and Capt. Hartwell turn out to be the same 
person. Capt. Hartwell never liked me, and 
what did he do but accuse me of stealing from 
him that Bible and gold anchor, me whom you 
taught to be honest, father. He had me 
arrested * 

“ Oh,” said Angel, a real case ! ” 

“ The shame of it ! ” growled Sidney Waters, 
and a general howl of indignation went up from 
the kitchen auditors. It was like a remom 
strance from a den of lions. 

** * But he did not keep me long, I tell you. 
Percy James’ sister, Seraph — she is a real nice 
girl, mother — she flew round and got a Mr. 
Potts who takes a fancy to me — once I took 
some potatoes to him — well, she got him to bail 
me out. She is a smart girl and I feel very 
much indebted to her.’ ” 

“ Ah, Joe ! ” murmured Angel. 

Well, I don’t care,” said her mother. “ She 
is a nice girl, and I’ll stand up for her. She 


HIS OWN STORY. 269 

took pity on a poor boy in a strange land, an 
honest boy too.’' 

Angel, you would have done the same 
for Nat Perry,” said Kittie. 

Mr. Waters put in an oar to row the wander- 
ing subject back to its course; “ Let us have 
the rest, Angel ! I can hardly hold in, I feel 
so indignant. What will become of our boys if 

trained to be honest, they can be charged ” 

‘‘Come, husband ! ” admonished Mrs. Waters. 
“We want the rest. Go on, Angel ! ” 

She resumed ; “ ‘ Now guess, folks, who my 

lawyer was? Nat Perry ! Yes sir, Nat Perry 
really. He went through the form of getting 
an old lawyer, but Nat stood behind him and 
managed the whole thing ; really, Nat did it.’ ” 
Every one in the kitchen said, “ Nat Perry ! 
Why!” 

“ Good for Nat ! ” added his father. “ I 
always knew he had a good head ’tween his 
shoulders.” 

“Angel don’t think so,” observed Kittie, 
“ or she would say something about him.” 

“ Now everybody keep still and give me a 
chance,” clamored the blushing Angel. “ I 
shall never get through this letter. Joe says — 
let me see — yes, here it is,” 

“ ‘ He would put my case through, and he did 
splendidly. I felt proud of him. He hunted 


270 A SALT WATER HERO. 

witnesses up to show my good character, like 
Henry Haven and some of the Ann Batten men 
still here. He wanted some testimonials that 
you said were sent by people at home, but 
they never came. So he got along without 
them.* ” 

''That is queer now!” broke in Waters 
Senior with a loud voice. “ We sent them.” 

“ A great mystery ! ” moaned his wife. 

Well, well, let them go ! Mere compli- 
ments! The thing is to have the merit of 
honesty, and Joe had all that,” said his proud 
father. ‘‘Read on, Angel ! ” 

‘ And he showed up Capt. Hartwell, I tell 
you. Well, I don’t know as I should have got 
off, for it looked against me when I had in my 
possession the Bible and anchor, and you know 
I said they did belong to him once. The only 
person who could help me was Percy James 
who gave them to me, and he was away — but 
guess who should walk into the court-room ? 
Whom would you guess ? Percy himself ! 

“ ‘ Seraph James got him. She is a smart 
girl. She knew he ought to arrive in port 
almost any day and she watched the steamers 
from Europe and the shipping — ^yes, I tell you 
she is smart, fairly surprising me, being one of 
the quiet kind — and ’ ” 


HIS OWN STORY. 27 1 

“ That is the kind ! ” murmured Sidney 
Waters. 

“ ‘ And she had others watching for Percy, 
and if he didn’t get into port just in the nick of 
time ! He came in his grandmother’s carriage 
— Seraph drove — to the court-house. In, he 
burst. I heard a scraping on the floor, a kind 
of panting, you know, as if some one was in a 
hurry, and I looked up and if there wasn’t 
Percy James ! I would about as soon have ex- 
pected to see one rise from a grave-yard. I 
just cried out, “ Why, Percy James ! ” Well, 
the judge stared, but I guess he didn’t care. 
Well, Percy’s testimony just settled it, really. 
Capt. Hartwell denied it — he is Cousin Charles 
remember — and he had Sam Peters there — you 
know I told you that Sam and I had a falling 
out and he had a falling into the water too and 
I picked him out — and several saw Sam Peters 
and the captain winking and whispering in the 
court-room. Then Sam testified that he was 
with Percy and me, and he said that the 
Bible and anchor pin were not given to me, 
but Nat was too smart for him. He just gave 
a hint to our old lawyer and got Sam into a 
corner, snarled him all up and proved that he, 
Sam, was somewhere else. Well, it was rich. 
It did not do any good, all the effort that the 
other side made to crush me 


2/2 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


** Abominable, tryin’ to put down a poor 
boy ! ” groaned Mrs. Waters. “ An honest boy 
too!'' 

‘^Shameful, shameful! Wish I had been 
there,” said her husband, “ to ask them if 
that was the way they were going to treat 
Americans ! ” 

“ Well,” said Angel, “ they could not put Joe 
down. Now, I think he had some fine friends 
there. The English like fair play. I will read 
on. Here is where I left off ; * The effort 
that the other side made to crush me was just 
a fizzle. When it was all over and I was a free 
man again, the people wanted to cheer Nat 
Perry and me.' ” 

Ah, I see,” observed the father, shaking his 
head approvingly, ** those English people know 
a thing or two. It speaks well for them. All 
of the same blood as we, a fine set, I see, I 
see.” 

Angel continued ; “ * The afterpart of the 
day’s proceedings interested people just as 
much as the forepart. After I had been 
cleared, it was poor, poor Pompey’s turn. He 
was the steward of the Ann Batten, and Capt. 
Hartwell had him arrested for breaking into the 
house of Grandma James. Pompey happened 
to be round, about that time, and it was a 


HIS OWN STORY. 


273 


colored man, or rather a white man disguised 
as a colored man, that I saw at night in the 
house and trying to rob Mrs. James’ drawer. 
Poor Pompey ! He was all broken down about 
it. Somebody near me in the court-room said. 

He is getting so pale with fright that he will 
be a white man by the time this trial is over.” 
I was wondering how the captain — that Cousin 
Charles you know — would get witnesses. Well, 
he himself swore that he saw Pompey prowl- 
ing round the house about sundown, and Sam 
Peters swore that he saw Pompey going along 
the road with a hammer in his hand that same 
afternoon, and then of course I had to testify. 
I was obliged to say that I had seen Pompey 
about the house the next morning, but that 
helped Pompey if anything, for Nat told our 
lawyer to tell them a man would be a fool to 
rob a house and then hang round there in open 
sight the next day. People who rob don’t gen- 
erally do that ’ ” 

“ Smart boy, that Nat ! ” ejaculated Mr. 
Waters. 

“ ‘ But of course I had to go farther back than 
this and tell all I knew, that I saw the robber, 
that his face was covered with a black mask 
but his hand was white, and that we picked up 
a black glove. Well, it seems Nat hunted 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


274 

along the road there by the farm-house, and 
picked up a black mask. And when Nat or the 
lawyer was examining Pompey who was al- 
lowed to testify, he proposed that the old cook 
should try to put on the glove. It was no go. 
The glove was too big for him. “ Now tell him 
to put on the mask ! ” whispered Nat, to my 
lawyer. Pompey happened to have a broad 
nose and big lips. For the first time since he 
has been under arrest when I have seen him, 
did he break out into a smile. “ Yer Honor,’' 
said he, “a white man must hab worn dose 
lips in dis yer. Don’ fit me, nor dis yer nose.” 
How the people roared ! You might have 
heard them in Shipton, one could fancy. 
‘‘ Your honor,” said our lawyer, “ I would like to 
suspend the examination here, and call Capt. 
Hartwell again to the stand.” — Nat put our 
lawyer up to this. — The captain came forward 
with an air of great importance. “ I would like 
to have the captain,” said our lawyer — Nat told 
him — ** try on this glove and this mask.” Wasn’t 
there a hubbub in the room then ! Oh, you 
don’t know what a rage Capt. Hartwell was in ! 
He would not be insulted. He declared it was 
a shame. He appealed to the judge. He said 
he had plenty of witnesses, and one in particu- 
lar who had not come, and while another wit- 


HIS OWN STORY. 275 

ness was on the stand, he would just like to step 
out and see why that very important witness 
was not here. Looking mad as a hatter, he 
was allowed to step out while a witness was 
giving testimony, but just think of it ! Capt. 
Hartwell did not come back, no sir! People 
stared and wondered why he did not come, but 
he did not show himself again ! All a trick to 
get a chance to slip off. Of course, Pompey 
was given his freedom, for there was not enough 
to hold him. Everybody was glad except Sam 
Peters, and he took his bad face off as soon as 
possible. Now didn’t Nat Perry do well ? ’ ” 
*‘Yes, yes! ’’cried every Waters there in 
the kitchen, while Angel looked both confused 
and proud, and holding the letter up before 
her face begged, “Now let me read! Nat 
Perry said — dear me, Joe said that ‘ Nat was 
in a lawyer’s office once. It was before he 
went to sea, and picked up some points. We 
all tell him he ought to be a lawyer. Don’t 
you think I have reason to feel good ! Pom- 
pey is just beside himself with joy. Percy 
James is happy too to think he got home in 
season to help me. We all wondered why 
Percy stayed away so long. You see he ought 
to have come home some time ago, certainly 
when the captain did (he went to Europe with 


276 A SALT WATER HERO. 

Capt. Hartwell). Seraph — she is a bright girl 
I tell you — she guessed that the captain kept 
him away on purpose so that Percy shouldn’t 
be here and interfere with tihe making of 
Grandma James’ will. The captain had been 
urging grandma to make her will, hurrying her 
up and he wanted her to remember him and 
make him executor and a sort of guardian of 
the young people and trustee of property 
she might leave to Seraph and Percy. Well, 
a neighbor tells us now that Capt. Hartwell 
boasted, when he was drunk, that he would fix 
the old lady’s property if he could get her to 
make out the will before Percy got home. 
Percy and Seraph have been dead set against 
her giving the captain any kind of a chance to 
handle the property. Now that Percy has got 
home, he says the captain told him he must 
visit some relatives in Scotland before coming 
home, that his health demanded traveling, and 
the captain gave him money to journey with. 
It all turns out why the captain was so anx- 
ious Percy should see those dear relatives. 
Oh, the captain is a rascal ! He wanted to 
gain time. Rascal ! ’ ” 

“ Yes, yes ! ” said every one in the Waters 
group. Not one but that voted the captain a 
rascal, voting promptly and often. After this 


HIS OWN STORY. 


277 


unanimous balloting, Joe’s letter had another 
chance ; ‘“I have one more piece of news. It 
is first-rate. That friend of mine, Mr. Potts, 

the one that Seraph got to bail me out ’ ” 

“ I shall be jealous of that Seraph,” thought 
Angel, and then proceeded ; ‘‘ ‘ He has bought 
the Ann Batten of those that Capt. Grimes 
sold her to, and if you’ll believe it, Mr. Potts 
is going to send her to the States and we are 
coming in her ’ ” 

Hold on, Angel ! ” cried the father. 
** Want to take it in ! ” 

^‘Hoorrah ! ” shouted Sammy, while Kitty 
danced excitedly about the room. Mr. Waters 
smiled and wanted to say something, but 
could only smile again and look watery about 
the eyes. 

** I’ll read it again ! Oh, good ! ” said Angel. 
‘ Mr. Potts is going to send her to the States 
and we are coming in her, and Capt. Grimes 
who has had one small sea-job here, will, as 
soon as he can get free, take command of her. 
She will carry some sort of cargo and bring 
back one here, and if she goes a-whaling again, 
Capt. Grimes can have the chance to command 
her. However that may be, those of us round 
here belonging to the old crew can go home in 
her if they wish, and here is one that is com- 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


278 

ing, and Nat Perry another, doing a mate's 
duties ' " 

** Glory enough for one day ! " said Mr. 
Waters with a trembling voice. Proceed, 
Angel ! " 

“ Let me see. Well, here comes some mes- 
sages : ‘Love to father and mother! Tell 
Sammy and Kitty we will do some sliding 
together, this winter ! Angel, you will want 
to know Seraph ! ’ ” 

“ I don’t know, Joe, whether I do or not," 
was Angel's comment on Joe’s opinion. “ Oh 
— I guess I do ! Yes, I do! ” 

“Now I think she must be a very nice girl, 
and I am prepared to like her,” said Mrs. 
Waters. “Yes, Angel, I can say that.” 

“ Oh, mother, I guess it is nothing so serious 
as that.” 

The father was muttering, “ Yes, ought to 
be done — immediately — now.” He empha- 
sized his opinion with a shake of the head. 

“What do you mean, father?” inquired 
Angel. “ Joe ought to do something serious 
about that girl immediately? ” 

“What ? ” said the astonished father, coming 
back from his wandering mood and staring in 
perplexity. “ I meant we ought to celebrate 
this occasion. Joe has escaped great peril. 


HIS OWN STORY. 279 

He is coming home. We ought to celebrate 
the good news, at once, now, Angel.” 

‘‘Well, yes, father, I agree to that, and 
how ? ” 

“ Can’t we have something special for sup- 
per?” 

Angel and Mrs. Waters looked staggered. 
Something special for supper or any other 
meal, was among the things unexpected in the 
Waters-home. Angel though was a creature 
for domestic emergencies and her mother al- 
ways co-operated. 

“ If Sammy can get me an egg ” 

“Been out once, sister,” said Sammy sorrow- 
fully, “ and none was there.” 

“ Well, look once more ” 

“ And tell them they must — out there — 
must,” said the father. “ No ‘ may ’ about it. 
We will wait. They must get us an egg.” 

In about two minutes, the waiting group 
heard a shriek in the direction of the hen- 
house. 

“ Got one, got one ! ” 

Sammy rushed into the room, holding up a 
precious egg. It occasioned about as much 
excitement as the receipt of Joe’s letter. 

“ Oh, good ! ” said Angel. “ Now for flap- 
jacks for supper, father ! ” 


28 o 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


‘‘That’s it! I knew, Angel, there must be 
considerateness enough among those hens to 
do something on this important occasion.” 

“ Well, father, we’ve got the egg. And 
mother, can’t we have one of your molasses 
apple-pies ? ” 

“ Yes, and if we go without coffee to-morrow 
morning, we can have coffee to-night,” sug- 
gested the mother. 

“ Good ! ” declared the father, who knew 
when to-morrow morning came, the coffee-pot 
would somehow get upon the table in due 
season, all through Angel’s knack at meeting 
emergencies. 

Such a supper ! 

If it was picturesque and pathetic to see 
what efforts the Waters family must make to 
achieve anything as unusual as that supper, 
it was delightfully gratifying to see how honest 
and hearty was their enjoyment of this celebra- 
tion, to notice how warm and sincere was their 
love for one another, and for that absent sailor- 
boy. Without such love, the costliest banquets 
afford little pleasure that is satisfactory. 

Did the sailor-boy’s family lie down that 
night to happy dreams ? He that very night 
woke up to an ugly reality. 


CHAPTER XX. 

A villain’s villainy. 

IT /"HAT’S that?” wondered Joe, waking 
V V up out of a sound sleep. “ Somebody 
calling, and a light and that noise on the win- 
dow? ” 

If nobody had called and Joe was out of 
the way in thinking he heard a voice, he was 
not out of the way in thinking he caught the 
sound of a noise on the window. 

“ There it is, a tapping, a knocking ! That 
light too! I’ll go to the window !” said Joe. 
At the window, he saw a light outside, and 
against the window-pane he saw a black pole 
that kept up the knocking he had heard. 

“ What does that mean ? I’ll raise the win- 
dow and look out,” resolved Joe. 

The pole here disappeared. 

“Who’s there? What’s wanted? Nat 
Perry ! Henry Haven ! Who is it ? ” asked 
Joe leaning out of the window. 

“ Henry Haven ! ” said a voice in low tones. 


282 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


** All right ! I’ll be down,” replied Joe, and 
he dropped the window and began to dress. 

If he had had an ear outside the window, he 
would have caught the sound of a chuckle 
which might have put him on his guard. Say- 
ing to himself, ** Henry wants me for something 
and was very thoughtful not to rout the whole 
house,” he stole gently down stairs and then 
out doors. No Henry though was to be seen ! 
Instead, Joe saw a lantern not far from the 
north west corner of the house. He ran toward 
the light. 

'‘You there, Henry?” asked Joe. "What 
is wanted? ” 

There was no reply. There was just a lan- 
tern on the ground, and lanterns never speak. 
People are generally satisfied if such articles 
give good light and this one was rather smoky. 
Joe boldly ventured toward the lonely, smoky 
lantern. He began to be suspicious, but he had 
faith in the presence of Henry Haven some- 
where. He was about to reach out his hand 
toward the lantern, purposing to go after 
Henry and hunt him up if Henry would not 
come to him, when suddenly he began to sink ! 
The surface beneath him mysteriously yielded, 
and down he went — into a black hole some- 
where ! 


A villain’s villainy. 


283 


His first thought was, “ got into the old well!” 
This was a disused well supposed to be securely 
covered. 

Joe’s second thought was, “ where am I going 
and how far shall I go? ” 

A quantity of dirt and boards came rattling 
down upon him as if to emphasize the fact that 
he was going downward, and this mass was 
disposed to hasten his descent ! 

“Got to go somewhere and how far?” 
thought Joe. 

Then another thought began to chill and 
freeze him in this dark, close pit, “ The water ! ” 
Yes there was water in the old well undoubtedly, 
and how deep ! Was it over one’s head ? 

Hitting this side of the well and then the 
opposite, saying to himself, “ Well, I can 
swim ! ” he abruptly splashed into a lot of cold, 
slimy water, and in a moment more came to the 
end of his journey. He could feel the stones 
under his feet, and could say that he had arrived. 
The water came up to his waist. As if to tell 
him that the life in the well was aware that he 
had arrived, something wriggled past his pocket! 

“ Snakes ! ” he said shrinking away from this 
intruder. But was not he the intruder? 
Something or somebody seemed to consider 
him in this light, for another object that could 


284 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


move, dropped from a stone in the wall, and 
cold and slimy and repulsive, roughly brushed 
Joe’s hand in falling. 

“ Ugh ! Frog or lizard ! ” groaned Joe. 

But Joe Waters was not one to stay down 
in the bottom of a well, groaning and shivering. 
He was just the one to fight his way up to the 
top of the institution, and he was planting his 
hands upon the stones on either side, placing 
his feet also in position for a grand effort, when 
a sudden light was shot down into the well 
and a voice was shot down with the light, a 
voice that was a sneer and a taunt : “ Hul-lo ! 
How do you like it down there with the snakes 
and the frogs ? ” 

It was not Henry Haven’s voice by any 
means. Neither was it Henry Haven’s face 
thrust over the curb of the well. 

‘‘You villain !” cried Joe looking up. “If 
I were up there, I would trounce you ! ” 

“ If ! ” cried Cousin Charles alias Capt. Hart- 
well, mockingly, “ Wait awhile down there ! 
and I’ll give you something to think of, you 
mean little liar ” 

Joe could not catch the closing words of this 
affectionate address. 

“ We will see about that,” said Joe. “ Just 
let me get up there ! ” 


A villain’s villainy. 285 

He thrust an elbow so hard into the stone wall 
of his prison that it seemed like digging into it. 
Another elbow he rammed against the opposite 
stones, pressing up at the same time with his 
hands, and he stuck the toes of his shoes into 
available crevices. He was making good prog- 
ress, working his way upward, when an ugly rap 
on the head was given him with a long pole, 
and then his arms received a series of jabs. 
“ Take that, you sneak ! ” shouted Cousin 
Charles. Poor Joe dropped into the watery 
depths of his prison, almost stunned by the 
blow received on the head. 

The cold water revived him, and he began 
to feel round for another chance to locate 
favorably his hands and feet, when the same 
cruel voice shrieked down, “ Here, here ! 
Don’t you try that ! Stay down ! Take — 
that ! ” 

Joe was now on the lookout. He could 
see in the direction of his jailer better than the 
jailer could see in the direction of his prisoner, 
and grabbing the pole while dodging its thrust, 
Joe gave a sudden, powerful pull, and not only 
wrenched it out of Cousin Charles’ hands but 
brought him down so heavily against the stone 
curbing, that he groaned in pain and cursed 
stormily. 


286 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


“ Ha — ha ! ” shouted Joe. “ Ha — ha ! Who’s 
ahead ? ” 

“ You are not ! I’ll kill you ! Take that ! ” 

It was a stone now that came down into the 
well, but luckily it missed its aim. 

“ Matters are getting serious ! ’’thought Joe, 
trying with the pole and his lifted hands to 
make a shield for his head. 

“Help!” shouted Joe, thinking the cry 
might reach somebody. 

It was horrible to be down there in that in- 
ferno, a bloody enemy above him, no friend 
knowing of his danger. 

Where was Henry Haven? 

Where was Grandma James ? 

Where was Seraph? Where were his father 
and mother and Angel ? Oh, horrible ! Did not 
anybody, anything, appreciate his condition ? 

“ Moo-o-o ! ” What was that ? 

It was a cow lowing in the barn, the very one 
that had kicked over Joe’s pail. How pleasant 
this sound of the animal was in Joe’s ears ! It 
seemed to disconcert his jailer. “Stop that! 
You are rousing all the world. Take — take 
that ! ” hissed the villain, sending a stone at the 
barn. “ And you feller in the well, take this ! ” 
said the same voice above, a missile accompany- 
ing his hatred. 


A villain’s villainy. 


287 


This stone did damage, for it struck Joe’s 
hand, and though the head was saved, the hand 
was cruelly bruised and Joe felt the warm blood 
trickling down the skin. He heard his jailer 
say, as if looking at his watch, ** What is the 
time ? Time enough to start a bla — and a 
quick run followed it. 

What was the rest of the word ! Bla — what 
letters next ? 

** Bla-ze ? ” wondered Joe. 

The light of the lantern went with his enemy, 
and Joe’s listening ear caught the sound of a 
crackling, and a lurid light dropped upon the 
mouth of Joe’s dungeon ! Horrors ! 

** Fire-re ! ” shouted Joe. He knew too what 
had been fired. There stood between the 
house and the barn a haystack. If fired, it 
was so near either building that it might 
ignite both. Joe had often thought what a 
tinder-box had been piled up by somebody be- 
tween the two buildings, and he knew now it 
was on fire. 

** Fire-re ! ” he again shouted. 

** Stop that ! ” cried the incendiary, and a 
shower of stones came rattling down on Joe’s 
lifted arms, striking also his head. 

** Fire !” shouted Joe. Again he shrieked. 
Fire ! ” 


288 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


Oh ! It was agony to think of the peril in 
which were those dear to him, and yet he could 
not move a step toward their protection. He 
imagined the flames rushing upon the farm- 
house, entering it, stealing swiftly from room to 
room, invading Seraph’s chamber, burning her — 
“ Fire ! ” he yelled frantically. 

“ I’ll stop that ! I’ll pen you up and 
smother you,” shouted the demon-jailer. 

“What — is he going to box me up?” 
thought Joe in new alarm. 

Yes, the incendiary was now pulling various 
pieces of plank over the mouth of the well. 

“ Villain ! ” screamed Joe, furiously plying his 
pole and trying to upset the lid of this stone 
and wood coffin in which his enemy meant to 
bury him. The demon now went to work and 
piled stones upon this coffin-lid, and Joe soon 
gave up his useless efforts to stay the diabol- 
ical work. 

How hollow and smothered sounded now his 
warning cry of fire ! To think that those in the 
house might soon be burning and he buried 
alive! Terrible! “No sir!” muttered Joe, 
setting his teeth firmly. “ Not going to give 
it up ! ” 

He once more began to climb out of his 
dungeon, bracing himself by his arms and feet 


A villain’s villainy. 289 

against the sides of his repulsive grave, and 
then working himself gradually up. It was a 
hard, violent and even painful effort he was 
obliged to make, for his injured hand was lame 
and sore. 

“Must go!” grunted Joe, still pressing his 
way upward. 

“ Ah, here I am at last, at the top of this 
— tomb ! Where’s a crack ? ” he wondered. 

He found one in the rude floor Cousin 
Charles had laid, and pressing his mouth 
against it, he screamed “ Fire ! ” 

To his surprise, there was no response by 
Cousin Charles to this. Joe supposed the latter 
would run to the well and try to crowd him 
down and cover him up again. 

“ Isn’t he round to put me down ? What is 
to prevent my going out?” reflected Joe. 
“ I’ll try it any way.” 

He now pressed against every plank to see if 
possibly there might be one piece that would 
yield a little. 

“ She gives just here ! ” said Joe, testing the 
cofifin-lid at one side. 

“Yes, she really moves! Now let me shove 
up with all my might ! Got my back under ! 
Now for all the muscles of Joe Waters, Henry 
Haven and Nat Perry — hun — now ! Good ! ” 


290 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


The plank yielded to this strong pressure, 
and the stones upon it fell off as Joe raised 
the plank higher and higher. 

“ Oh, isn’t it good to get one’s head out of 
that cold, musty, snaky hole!” murmured 
Joe. “ Now let me see what is going on ! ” 
The haystack was afire. The outside had 
been burned away, and the interior was turn- 
ing to a cinder, rolling up a cloud of black 
smoke. 

“ Good ! The house is not afire ! ” said Joe, 
facing the farm-house. “ And the barn is all 
right, though hot at the corner, I imagine, next 
the fire. Good ! But who is that young 

woman throwing on water — and ” 

Here, the same young woman who had emp- 
tied a pail of water on the corner of the house 
exposed to the burning stack, chanced to turn 
toward the well her fair face. How its expres- 
sion changed to one of terror I 

“ Oh, heavens ! ” she shrieked, and throwing 
down her pail, ran from this strange apparition 
coming up out of the ground. 

He yelled with energy, as he ran to her, 
Seraph! Seraph! It’s Joe! It’s Joe ! No 
harm, Seraph ! Hold on ! I won’t hurt you ! ” 
Seraph trembling, then paralyzed with fright, 
fell to the ground. 


A villain’s villainy. 291 

Another moment, he had caught up this 
precious burden in his arms. 

‘‘ Oh, Joey dear! Is it you? Tm so relieved! 
I thought of that old Bible-picture of the Witch 
of Endor and somebody coming up out of the 
earth. Oh, me ! ” 

“ What is it ? Where is he ? ” shrieked an- 
other voice, and Grandma James now appeared, 
bringing forward the old queen’s arm. She 
dropped it, in her nervous haste, and stumbled, 
over it. ‘‘ Oh — oh ! ’’ she screamed. Had it 
shot her ? 

** Oh, it’s — only Joe ! Don’t worry, 
grandma,” replied Joe, who had thought of 
depositing Seraph on a pile of wood, but that 
young woman promptly gained her feet as soon 
as her grandmother appeared. 

Joe and Seraph ran to the old lady and 
helped her up. 

“ Too bad ! ” said Joe. “ You hurt ? ” 

“ I ain’t hurt. I heard you and Seraph, and 
this fire too — and you ” 

‘‘Oh, I’m all right now,” said Joe, pluckily, 
but Cousin Charles tried to shut me down in 
that well, but he couldn’t do it, grandma ! ” 

“He did!” “Oh, the wretch!” “The 
scoundrel ! ” were exclamations bursting from 
the lips of the two females. 


292 A SALT WATER HERO. 

“ Oh, Seraph ! Look ! See there, grandma ! 
excitedly shouted Joe. The roof of the 
house is afire ! Where is that little ladder? I 
see it ! Now bring me all the pails of water 
you can. Quick ! 

The wind had for a while carried away the 
fire from the house and barn, but a slight shift- 
ing of the current of the breeze drifting a 
clump of burning hay to the roof, this fire- 
ship had ignited the dry shingles. 

“ Oh — oh ! ” groaned grandma. How they 
all flew round ! Joe brought the ladder. This 
was long enough to reach the eaves of the low 
farm-house, and with two pails of water 
brought by Seraph and Grandma James, the 
ignited shingles were drenched. 

^‘That is soaked ! ” declared Joe proudly. 

There was nothing now to be done save to 
watch the smoldering stack, occasionally drench 
the exposed corner of the house and then that 
of the barn, for all serious danger was past. 

The three members of this small fire-brigade 
stayed on duty till the sun arose, making the 
warm kitchen their head-quarters but sallying 
out every few minutes to inspect the black 
and ashy heap where a hay-stack once had 
stood, then looking up at the eaves and the 
roof of the house and then barnward. 


A villain’s villainy. 


293 


What a hero Joe was in the eyes of Grand- 
ma James and Seraph, and how tenderly they 
bound up his hand, and poured upon it such a 
stream of pity that though the hand directly 
did not feel it, yet it went to the hero’s heart 
and was so like a balmy liniment to this mem- 
ber, that indirectly the hand seemed to be 
reached and helped ! He told his story to his 
eagerly listening audience which in turn warmly 
applauded. 

All owing to you that we are alive ! ” af- 
firmed Seraph. 

Oh, no, but I had something of a time ! 
Cousin Charles got me down in that well, mak- 
ing a trap of it, as I can see now, removing the 
old flooring and putting down a few strips and 
some turf on top, and then setting his lantern 
near by ” 

‘‘ The murderer ! ” exclaimed grandma. 

“Of course,” continued Joe, “I went 
toward the lantern, imagining as I have already 
told you that Henry Haven was round and 
wanted me for something. Down I went ! 
All I could do was to fight Charles and bawl 
* fire ’ as loud as I could.” 

“Yes, and that was what awoke me, and 
grandma she heard it, and we both went out. 
Ha, ha ! grandma took her pail in one hand and 
the gun in the other,” said Seraph. 


294 A SALT WATER HERO. 

“ Didn’t you see anything of Cousin 
Charles ? ” inquired Joe. 

** Nothing ! ” replied Grandma James. He 
had got the whole house aroused and it was 
getting late in the night, and he thought it was 
prudent to leave, I s’pose. Then he probably 
knew Percy was at home or as a gineral thing, 
and knew he could not handle us all.” 

** Percy will be back, to-morrow, I don’t 
doubt.” 

‘‘Yes, Joe, I told him to hunt up a certain 
man who thought he might like to buy the 
farm, and it is thirty, most forty miles to his 
place, and I told Percy to take two days for it.” 

“ If that haystack-burner had carried out his 
plans,” said Seraph, “ there wouldn’t have 
been much property to buy except the ground. 
He would have had both barn and house in 
ashes.” 

“You two women saved everything,” de- 
clared Joe. 

But the two female members of the fire-bri- 
gade would not hearken to any such statement. 

It was the young man trapped in the well 
who had done everything, who had driven that 
savage. Cousin Charles, from the premises, who 
had brought Seraph and her grandmother from 
the house so soon to be fired, whose hand had 


A villain’s villainy. 295 

received a wound in that trap, the well, who 
had afterwards with that hand carried countless 
pails of water, who had faced the fire-breath- 
ing dragon on the roof as well as in the hay- 
stack. Joe had done everything, or they tried 
to make him think so, as he sat in the choicest 
of Grandma James’ arm chairs while they 
heaped attention after attention upon him. 

“All’s well that ends well!” said Grandma 
James. ** It is true I lost my haystack, but I 
can stand that. I suppose Cousin Charles, 
because I wouldn’t do as he wanted me, 
thought he would fire my property when as he 
supposed it was not insured. But every cent’s 
worth is covered and if he had gone to the 
person who knew, he might have found that 
out.” 

Cousin Charles though had gone to the per- 
son who did not know, and understanding that 
the property was not protected, applied the 
torch to it. Yes, all’s well that ends well. 


CHAPTER XXL 


HOMEWARD BOUND ! 

I T was good to be on board the Ann Batten 
once more, to look up and see her sails 
swollen with a wind from the vigorous north, 
to look ahead and see that her prow was 
pointed south. 

“ That means home! ” thought Joe. “ Hur 
j »» 

It was an unfinished “ hurrah.” Joe was 
not taking all his heart away from Newfound- 
land. Part of it was in the keeping of a per- 
son whose whereabouts he could not state. 

“The greatest mystery!” exclaimed Joe as 
leaning over the vessel’s rail he looked toward 
the sinking and dimming coast of grand, pict- 
uresque Newfoundland. “ Grandma James 
sold her farm to the man that Percy went to see 
and she obtained a good price for it. While I 
was in St. John's getting ready for the trip 
home, she and Seraph and Percy disappeared.” 
Yes, disappeared as completely as would 


HOMEWARD BOUND! 


297 


any piece of white ice that Joe saw in the blue 
water when he leaned over the Ann Batten’s 
rail. Not a trace of the family was left behind. 
Ere long, not a bit of that ice would be seen. 

Before leaving St. John’s, Joe for a few days 
had been making his headquarters on board 
the Ann Batten, and preparing for the voyage 
home. The vessel was expected to sail on 
Tuesday. Monday, Joe said, “ I will walk out 
to the farm.” 

When he neared the house, he anticipated, 
after his cold autumn walk, such a warm recep- 
tion ! 

“ I shall see the smoke coming up out of the 
chimney, and there will be a nice bright fire on 
the hearth below, and perhaps Grandma James 
will put a little lunch on the table and — Seraph 
herself first of all — perhaps — may come to the 
door and say, * We are so glad you came ! We 
wanted to tell you our plans. Come right 
in ! ’ ” 

How bright and comforting her smile of 
welcome ! Instead of that, no smoke out of 
the old-fashioned chimney, no fire on the 
hearth, no lunch on the table, no grandma, no 
Percy ! Above all, no Seraph had met a 
chilled sailor-boy at the door and warmed him 
up with her smile of welcome ! The house 


298 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


looked cold and empty and cheerless. All his 
knocking only woke up some dismal echoes 
which he was entirely willing should go to 
sleep again. The knocking though did arouse 
a human presence that had been hidden some- 
where, for a stranger came round the corner of 
the house and gruffly asked, “ What’s wanted ? ” 

“ I wanted to see the people that lived here, 
sir.” 

“ They’ve moved away and I’ve bought the 
place. I haven’t moved in yet, just came 
down to look things over.” 

‘‘Do you know where the Jameses have 
gone ? ” 

“ I don’t. Gone somewhere.” 

Joe felt that suddenly a foundation had 
slipped out from under his feet, and he did not 
know where he was. He took a melancholy 
interest in going around the old house where 
Seraph had lived, in looking at the old well 
where a villain had tried to imprison him and 
out of which Joe popped his head and thereby 
frightened Seraph, in gazing at the ashy heap 
where once had been a blazing haystack that 
Seraph helped quench, in wandering through 
the old barn where Seraph had once helped 
him milk the cow. How much Seraph had 
been associated with everything ! 


HOMEWARD BOUND ! 299 

** Don’t understand where they have — she 
has — gone ! ” he said dolefully. 

His face brightened as he thought, ** There ! 
I may run across their tracks in St. John’s ! ” 

In the city, though, he did not come across 
those desired tracks. Rather, he did find 
them, but the tracks did not lead him to the 
people making them. Those who had seen 
the Jameses did not know where they had finally 
gone. 

Joe stopped before the saloon where Cousin 
Charles as Capt. Hartwell had been proprietor. 

“All shut up!” said Joe, gazing at the 
closed door. “ I suppose the proprietor has 
left town, and I should say he had better. If 
he were here, I should be inclined to ask him 
about the family. As it is, I shall have to 
ask the police where Capt. Hartwell is. They 
want to find him and make him smart for set- 
ting that fire.' Place looks empty 1 ” still solil- 
oquized Joe, gazing at the closed saloon. 
“ Wonder where Sam Peters may be, Sam who 
used to keep here for the captain ! ” 

Now if Joe could have found Sam, he might 
have learned something of interest. Percy 
James in behalf of the family had written a 
letter to Joe at St. John’s, the letter detailing 
their plans and asking him to come out to the 


300 A SALT WATER HERO. 

farm, a certain day. The letter was given to a 
neighbor who offered to serve as mail-carrier, 
leaving it in the city. The neighbor when in 
the city handed it to a stranger, resigning to 
him this privilege of mail-carrier, and saying, 
“ I want to go home, and if you are going by 
the post-office down there, just drop this for 
me.” 

The stranger nodded his willingness to be 
mail-carrier. 

Thank ye ! ” said the neighbor and turned 
his horse toward home. 

“Joe Waters, St. John's!” said the new 
mail-carrier frowning as he read the address. 
“ Goin’ to drop it for that milk-and-water chap ? 
Not if my name is Sam Peters ! ” 

With a feeling of satisfaction, he tore up the 
letter, and scattered the fragments in an out- 
of-the-way alley. 

If Joe wondered where the James-flock had 
gone and why they and Seraph in particular 
did not send some word to him, the James- 
flock wondered why Joe did not respond. 
When they lifted their wings and flew away 
from the old farm-house, the younger of the 
two females felt specially sad because Joe 
Waters had made no response to their invita- 
tion to come to them. 


HOMEWARD BOUND ! 


301 


Where had they flown from the farm-house ? 

Joe often raised this question, often dis- 
cussed it in his thoughts, and in sad perplexity 
was compelled to drop it. 

The voyage of the Ann Batten in itself was 
not eventful. The winter was growling not 
far away, and the blasts from the north while 
hastening the voyagers homeward, were sharp- 
edged and cut closer to the skin than was com- 
fortable. The stormy weather though that 
tried to block the Ann Batten’s way, was not 
serious. 

** We are having a pretty comfortable run,” 
Capt. Grimes told Joe, “considering that this 
is the Atlantic and that winter is just behind 
us, coming down from the north pole at a rapid 
rate. We are doing well.” 

There were signs on the ocean that other 
voyagers had not fared as well. One day the 
Ann Batten met an over-turned dory. 
Another day, the stern of a schooner was 
overtaken, the relic of a wreck. On a third 
occasion, the Ann Batten toward night was 
running rapidly before the wind. The dark 
was coming on fast. The sea was rough. 
The wind was from the east and it had been 
hounding the waves all day. The sun had set, 
so Capt. Grimes’ watch said, though there was 


302 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


no red and flaming sign of it in the western 
sky. There was too much mist upon the 
water to allow fine sunsets. The mist was 
thickening. The twilight was deepening. Joe 
and Henry Haven and Capt. Grimes stood on 
the deck, watching the sea ere this big dome 
of fog and deepening shadow shut down upon 
it and shut out everything. 

“ Cap’n, what’s that a-heaving in sight ? 
A-waving something! I can see something 
white!” exclaimed Henry Haven. 

Oh, yes ! ” said Joe. “ Close upon us, or we 
upon them ! ” 

It seemed as if out of the sea had been thrown 
a heavy spar with its appendage of two cling- 
ing men, as if a buried “ Help-p-p! ” had sud- 
denly and pitifully struggled to the surface, for 
this was the cry heard by the three men on the 
deck of the Ann Batten. ** Help-p-p ! Help- 
p-p ! ” It seemed like a grave abruptly open- 
ing, the dead strangely coming up to stare at 
and appeal to the living. But what could be 
done in a roughening sea, on the edge of a 
black night, in the midst of thickening folds of 
fog ? Capt. Grimes was very nimble in meet- 
ing emergencies like this. He was carrying in 
his hand a glass. He handed it to Henry 
Haven and sprang away to give needed orders. 


HOMEWARD BOUND! 


303 


This burly old whaler dashing from billow to 
billow, must if possible be laid along side of 
that drifting spar and its lonely burden of two 
wrecked souls. 

“ A rope ! ” somebody shouted. 

Already the whaler was too far beyond the 
castaways to make available any rope-throw- 
ing. Neither could a boat be lowered just 
then. The course of the Ann Batten must 
first be changed. 

“ She never minded her helm better,” said 
Henry Haven to Joe, but what of that? She 
tacked about, crossed and recrossed her old 
track, but not a sign of a drifting spar could 
be seen. It was dark before the search was aban- 
doned. Then all night the whaler was lying to, 
prepared to renew the hunt in the morning. 
From the main top and the deck, a lookout was 
kept up at daylight, as far as any watch was per- 
missible in the mist, but nothing could be 
discovered. The Ann Batten searched until 
noon, and then reluctantly she was headed for 
the south-west once more. 

All this made a deep impression on Joe. 
He often saw those two faces coming up out of 
the sea, faces pale, ghastly, appealing, and then 
caught that cry, “ Help-p-p ! ” The faces 
swiftly went by, their whiteness mingling with 


304 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


the foam of the sea, that despairing cry too 
passing away amid the confusing echoes of the 
wind. Faces going by and lost to sight one 
moment, and yet in Joe’s thoughts coming 
again and again, till it seemed as if in the sea 
were an endless procession of faces white as 
the billows’ foam, and one long, long pitiful 
shriek were going up, “ Help-p-p ! ” 

“ Can’t seem to get the thing out of my 
mind ! ” Joe told Henry Haven. 

“ Don’t wonder ! Most took my breath away 
at first, and when I looked through the Cap’n’s 
glass, I didn’t seem to have any breath left to 
say anything.” 

‘‘ Why?” 

“ Well, guess who those two men were ! ” 

“ I couldn’t. They might be fishermen. ” 

“ Not fishermen, if you mean those who go 
after fish like cod and pollock. If you mean 
something big as whales. I’d agree with you.” 

How so ? ” 

Well, I think those men were Sam Peters 
and Cap’n Hartwell.” 

‘‘ Sam Peters and Cap’n Hartwell ? ” 

“ I think so, though of course I might — 
might be mistaken. I remember Cap’n Hart- 
well, and he had a full heavy black beard, but 
he was quite bald on top. That fills the bill 


HOMEWARD BOUND! 


305 


for one of the men on that spar. Sam Peters 
had a ferocious mustache and nothing more on 
his face except his hooked nose, but his hair 
was thick and curly, and if that other man on 
the spar didn’t have all of these things, then my 
name is not Henry Haven. Then the Cap’n 
was dark, like an Injun, and Sam was a kind of 
chalk-white. Just so with those men! Then 
it would be as natural to see Sam and the 
Cap’n together as two peas alongside one an- 
other in a pod. May be mistaken of course, 
but I have my idea about it all the same.” 

** Just think of it! It wouldn’t be so sur- 
prising, for we heard that Sam and the Cap’n 
were seen on board a vessel in the harbor of 
St. John’s.” 

“ Not so surprising, and the Lord have 
mercy on them ! ” 

“ They are to be pitied ! ” 

“ Oh, yes ! Well, Joe, I have had a kind of 
revelation made to me, if I may call it so. Do 
you remember that talk you and I had together 
and you thought I had better turn over a new 
leaf?” 

“ Yes, and you made a good point when you 
thought I had better turn one over myself.” 

‘‘ Yes, a revelation ! ” said Henry and he 
spoke with the air of one talking to himself. 


3o6 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


** I have had a kind of idea I could handle my- 
self as well as most folks, and this having re- 
ligion, this praying, this joining the church, I 

did not have much faith in, but ” 

He paused. Looking more serious yet, he 
continued ; “ But — when I saw Cap’n Hartwell 
a-cutting up so, and falsely charging Joe 
Waters with all sorts of things, and Sam Peters 
a-swearing to it, and then the Cap’n throwing 
his fire round loose at the farm-house, I said 
to myself, ‘ It is true you haven’t such an awful 
mean nature as that, but still it is human 
nature,’ and I could but say to myself, ‘ How 
might it be with you, if all the restraint were 
taken away, your rudder unshipped and pitched 
into the sea, and you just a-driving on’ — why, 
it made me afraid of myself. And I know 
well enough how it is when it comes to drink- 
ing. I have no power when I get agoing. 
Everything seems let loose. I spread all my 
canvas and drive on, without rudder, without 
compass, without chart, without a thing to 
hold or guide me. It frightens me when I 
give my mind to the subject, and I have got 
to this place, namely, to say no matter what 
Joe Waters may do, I know what I ought to 
do ” 


He paused again. 


HOMEWARD BOUND! 


307 


“And God helping me I’m agoing to do it.” 

It was Joe’s turn to speak ; 

“ Henry, that talk we had together stirred 
me up a good deal, and I made up my mind 
to begin with Joe Waters and not with Henry 
Haven and do the right thing. Yes, I made 
up my mind. Though I’m not what I’d like to 
be, still I know it has made a difference. I 
have got hold of something since I began to 
pray with all my heart — ‘ whole heart,’ the Bible 
puts it, but it is the same thing — I’ve got hold 
of something that stays by me, an anchor that 
holds in all sorts of weather.” 

“ That is the very thing I want, Joe,” added 
Henry, in tones almost whispered, “ and you 
pray for me, won’t you ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Joe, “ and you pray for me.” 

And so these two souls proposed to 
strengthen one another like ships on the toss- 
ing deep that sail together, that send to one 
another not only words of friendliness but out 
of their resources of sail or anchors or food, 
they send kindly and steadfast help. 

In the case of those other two souls that 
clinging to a frail and lonely spar, kept one an- 
other company in all the horrors of shipwreck, 
nothing definite was ever known. It was 
learned that Sam Peters and Cousin Charles 


3o8 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


had taken ship in a vessel that sailed away and 
was never heard from. Like many other ves- 
sels, it sank beneath the horizon and never rose 
again, and the deep, dread sea kept unbroken 
the secret of its grave. 


CHAPTER XXII. 


HOME AT LAST. 

F or several days in the home of Joe 
Waters, there had been a flutter of in- 
tense expectation. Joe Waters was coming 
home ! The glory of the autumn had gone. 
The maples in the lane leading down to the 
Waters-home, in October seemed to have been 
getting up gay flags for a great occasion. Did 
they fancy that up that very lane would come 
from the ancient dock a sailor-hero just from 
sea, and was this glory, this daily addition of a 
new star of gold or a fresh stripe of crimson, 
intended to be the welcome of the maples ? If 
so, they were disappointed. The hero did not 
come and every tapering maple limb stood at 
last like a stripped and disconsolate flag-staff. 
But there were the oaks on a hill rising above 
the opposite bank of the river. They still 
kept something of a purple flush, and was it 
reserved in readiness, a welcome from the oaks 
to Joe Waters? The oaks did not distinctly 
say, but on windy days kept up a continual 


310 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


and mysterious buzzing among their leaves, as 
if they had a secret they could reveal if so dis- 
posed. 

Yes, Joe was coming home finally. Such a 
flutter of expectation as there was in the 
Waters-home ! 

“ I reckon she will be here in perhaps three 
days — four at the furthest, folks — and won’t 
we give him a welcome ! ” said Father Waters, 
one November morning. 

“Yes, we will,” said Mrs. Waters, who, 
wrapped in an old morning-gown, was almost 
hugging the stove, the weather being chilly 
though bright. 

“ I am thinking of having smoked herring 
for Joe’s breakfast the next day after he gets 
here,” said Angel, the dear girl who was 
already planning for the comfort of her brother. 
“ A newspaper said yesterday it was sure the 
ship would be in before long. You know how 
Joe likes smoked herring.” 

“ I expect Joe won’t look at any fish of less 
size than a whale,” remarked Father Waters. 

“ Well, now, I am not going to have fried 
whale in this house for anybody ! ” declared 
Angel, energetically. “ I expect Joe is a regu- 
lar Eskimo by this time. He has got to come 
down to herring and be civilized.” 


HOME AT LAST. 


3II 

** Who will cook for poor Nat Perry ? won- 
dered Sammy Waters. 

“ I guess Nat Perry’s folks will have to cook 
for him,” said Angel, smartly. 

** I expect you wouldn’t give Nat Perry any 
whale, but just let him starve,” said the indig- 
nant Kitty. 

‘‘Now, young folks, I tell you,” said Angel, 
blushing, “ if you keep asking questions, I 
can’t make these pies for Joe that I am at work 
on. And — dear me ! if the cloves haven’t 
given out ! ” 

Something was always giving out in that 
family. This ingenious discovery at that par- 
ticular moment of an empty clove-box relieved 
Angel’s red face, but it brought a white one to 
Father Waters. 

“ Oh, dear ! ” he groaned, fishing in his gen- 
erally empty pockets. “ Have I got two cents 
for Sammy to go and buy some?” 

“ Don’t you worry, pa ! ” cried Angel, who 
knew every mood of her father and all stages 
of his pocket-book, and whose conscience was 
troubling her a bit with the thought that she 
had possibly thrown the household into unnec- 
essary alarm. “ I really think, pa, I can make 
what I have do, this time. Got to the bottom, 
but it is my last pie.” 


312 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


“ Oh ! ” said the relieved father. I guess I 
will go down to the dock then.” 

“ There, mother,” said Angel, when he had 
gone, “what do you suppose that dear man 
was doing at the dock yesterday ? ” 

“ I don’t know,” replied Mrs. Waters, feebly. 

“ Well, I didn’t find it out, but Mr. Springer, 
who takes care of the dock, told me that father 
was actually pacing off a spare place at one of 
the wharves to see if the Ann Batten could 
get in there. Then, to make sure, he was 
measuring with a piece of string. He didn’t 
want the vessel to go to another port to 
unload.” 

“ It suits your father to be doing that, Angel. 
They say the wharves are pretty full everywhere 
on the river. He likes to plan.” 

Yes, it suited Father Waters exactly to be 
planning and measuring in behalf of the inter- 
ests of other people, rather than to be hard at 
work caring for his own interests and for those 
at home. He did not willfully neglect his 
home, but he was not fond of hard work, and 
he did love to dream and plan. Returning 
from the dock, he now went to the shed- 
chamber, and sitting down by the window, he 
abstractedly gazed out upon the water, wonder- 
ing how soon the masts of the Ann Batten 


HOME AT LAST. 313 

would be seen tapering above the misty 
ocean. 

“ When she comes, it will be with the flood- 
tide of course,” he murmured. I am glad I 
posted that notice in the kitchen.” 

He had prepared a diagram, showing, for a 
week, at what time of day the Ann Batten 
might be expected to arrive at her wharf. 

“ I don’t say that this is exact,” he explained 
to his family while he admiringly gazed at the 
diagram, “ but that estimate — say — comes each 
day within — well — say four or five hours of the 
probable time.” 

Maybe if the wind is real strong,” said 
Angel, “ the Ann Batten will come dashing up 
when the tide is ebb.” 

“ Y-e-s,” said her father, abstractedly. All 
the time that Father Waters was making his 
wonderful diagram, there was no fish hanging 
on its string out in the shed-chamber. If he 
had stirred his legs as fast as his fingers, he 
might have secured some kind of a job and 
earned 2 l fish for that empty string. 

Father Waters was gazing out of the window 
in the shed-chamber, one morning, dreaming 
about whales, Greenland, and a possible whale- 
bone factory that he might be manager of. He 
suddenly heard a swift step on the stairway. 


314 A SALT WATER HERO. 

He knew it meant something, and he instinct- 
ively felt that it was something disagreeable. 
The quick step halted at the top of the stair- 
way. Then came a fall upon the floor, and a 
moan. Father Waters sprang up from the 
empty nail-cask on whose head he was sitting. 
He turned, and there was Angel ! She had 
fallen against the wall, clutching spasmodi- 
cally with one hand a newspaper, and the other 
hand she pressed against her temples. No 
blushes in that face now, but just a mass 
of pallor, as if a lily dead-white had suddenly 
bloomed out of the wood in the old shed-wall. 

“ Read — read that, father ! ” groaned Angel, 
opening her eyes feebly and pointing with one 
finger at a newspaper item. 

“What — what Sammy brought.^’* gasped 
the frightened father. Papers were generally 
brought by Sammy from the periodical store 
of Mr. Laighton who had very kindly said he 
would send to the Waters-family anything of 
the nature of news about the Ann Batten. 

“ Yes — yes ! ” gasped Angel — “ and the min- 
ister came with him. Oh, dear ! ” 

The clergyman coming to soften the effect 
of bad tidings? We will, though, let Father 
Waters read this item in the column of ship- 
ping news ; 


HOME AT LAST. 315 

“ We are very sorry to say that there is a rumor abroad 
that the Ann ” 

Here everything seemed to grow misty, like 
the sea clouded by the breath of the east wind, 
but Father Waters managed to see what came 
next : 

“ — Batten — has been lost.” 

He let the paper drop and groaned sympa- 
thetically with poor Angel. His boy, Joe, was 
very dear to him, and he knew that Angel was 
not only thinking of Joe, but of Nat Perry 
also. 

In thought, he could see an ocean heaving 
as in agony, a distant wreck, and oh ! was any 
boat coming from it to hearts waiting to wel- 
come it ashore ? 

However, in this world we must not only 
hear bad news but try to get over it, and soon 
Father Waters lifted his drooping head and 
looked at the paper again. His eyes chanced 
to rest on a little paragraph in one corner of 
the paper, down at the foot of the shipping- 
column. It was an obscure corner. As 
Father Waters read on, the mist before his 
eyes began to clear away : 

“ Boston. We are glad to state that the report of 
the loss of the Ann Batten is a mistake.” 


3i6 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


How the fog rolled all away ! Father Waters 
came to life again and shouted so loudly that 
Angel thought at first the poor man was 
going into a delirium of sorrow, actually losing 
his head. 

“ Hear, hear, Angel ! It’s a lie about the 
Ann Batten ! The people ought to be put 
in the penitentiary for life, that got up that 
lie. Hear this ! ” 

As he read Angel sprang to her feet. That 
white lily left the wall, and, instead, a flushed 
face like a rose was bent over the paper, while 
Father Waters read: 

“ It was a boat that was lost. Some of the crew 
in calm weather left the Ann Batten to capture a whale 
seen spouting. The boat was upset, but the men all 
were picked up by the Ann Batten, we rejoice to 
say.” 

“ Oh, father, I feel as if a million tons had 
been taken off my head ! ” exclaimed Angel. 

“ The villains who stuck that first item in — 
well ! Let them go, long as the Ann Batten 
is safe. She must be near port now.” 

‘‘And Nat ! ” added Angel in her thoughts. 

“ Hark ! ” ejaculated Father Waters. 
“ Hark ! ” 

“ What is that noise in the house ? ” asked 
Angel. 


HOME AT LAST. 


317 

It did not sound as if many mourners could 
be there. Such screaming and shouting all in 
joyful notes! 

Hurrah ! ” cried a voice, as the back door 
opened. 

Was it Sammy, or the clergyman, Mr. 
Anthony Walton ? 

Angel and Father Waters were trying to de- 
cide this question, when a heavy step Was 
heard on the platform outside the back door, 
then on the stairway leading up to the shed 
chamber, and the next moment, a big, stout, 
young sailor was shouting, Hullo, father! 
Hullo, Angel ! ” 

It was the enthusiastic Joe, who had not 
been cast away at sea, but was in the very shed- 
chamber, having just arrived. 

“Joe? What? My boy? Bless my 
eyes ! ” exclaimed the father, grasping Joe and 
hugging him, on one side, while Angel was 
round on the other side, hugging him there. 
The father could not see for the tears of joy 
brimming his eyes, and Angel was as blind on 
her side, but between them was something 
solid and yet demonstrative, and they clung 
to that beloved object fondly. 

“ Well, Joe, how did you come ? Rain down ? 
Don’t mean that, no rain here, but were 


3I8 a salt water hero. 

you blown here by an east wind ? Why, there 
is no Ann Batten in the dock, boy,” said the 
joyful father. 

“ The Ann Batten is ' below ’ as we say, at 
the river’s mouth, and will come up with the 
next tide. The cap’n said any of us who 
wished might come up in the pilot boat that 
brought us in from sea, and I just improved 
my chance,” explained Joe. 

Angel did want to ask if somebody else had 
come up in that pilot-boat, but she was pre- 
vented. 

There was a foot-step on the stairs, and 
quickly a voice was heard saying, “ Mr. 
Waters! Angel!” 

“ Nat Perry, why, why ! This is too much 
joy ! ” said Mr. Waters. 

Angel said nothing. She only covered her 
face with her hands and cried as if her tender 
heart were breaking, the dear creature ! 

“ Welcome, welcome, welcome ! ” said Mr. 
Waters, wringing Nat’s hand, as if he Sidney 
Waters were a clothes wringer, and he Nat 
Perry were a pillow-case or a towel in the 
process of wringing. 

Angel still said nothing. 

Then her father gave Joe a mysterious wink 
and beckoned him down stairs. Joe could 


HOME AT LAST. 3 IQ 

take a hint as quick as the next one, and 
Angel and Nat were left alone. 

Down in the shed, the father remarked 
solemnly, “ Poor girl ! It just broke her down 
and took her voice away, Joe.” 

“ Guess she will find it again. Don’t 
worry ! ” 

** I won’t,” said the father abstractedly. 


CHAPTER XXIII 


A CERTAIN CELEBRATION, 



HERE was a face pressed against the 


outside of a window-pane. The window 


was part of a house in the Waters-neighbor- 
hood where certain old friends, the Tomlinsons, 
had been living. The face belonged to Sidney 
Waters. If he pressed a finger against the lower 
lid of his left eye and pulled it down, he fancied 
that he might widen his orb of vision and could 
see more distinctly. It was in part fancy, and 
in part an old habit, a trick from boyhood. He 
might be as important a personage as janitor of 
the town hall, “ the right hand man ” of town 
officials, above all the father of a promising 
sailor-hero from the Arctic, and per Ann 
Batten just arrived, and the anticipated father- 
in-law of one Nat Perry, an officer on board the 
Ann Batten, still he was now executing an 
odd and undignified trick as he peeped through 
a certain window. While he is looking in 
there is time to say that the Waters-home had 


A CERTAIN celebration. 32 1 

not recovered from the excitement of Joe’s 
return, neither did it wish to recover. It pre- 
ferred to prolong this delightful excitement, 
and it was determined to have a ^and celebra- 
tion on the very morrow, a jolly dinner. That 
was Sidney’s suggestion. It would be at 
Joe’s expense, of course. That was agreeable 
to Joe. He could not do enough, generous 
boy. What acceptable presents he bestowed ! 
He remembered them all. He did not even 
forget that destitute string up in the shed- 
chamber, but when he went down town to 
“ see the boys,” he brought back with him a 
big piece of dried halibut, saying to Angel, 
“You know, sister, I like this for a dish, some- 
times. I will just hang it up on that fish-string 
in the shed-chamber until you want to use it.” 

“All right, Joey, dear,” said this amiable 
Angel. 

And now a big dinner just to celebrate ! 
And as the Tomlinsons were old and intimate 
friends living in the neighborhood, “ would it 
not be well, mother,” said the father to his 
wife, “ just to ask them ? ” 

She nodded her head and replied : “ They 
are going to move out of town, and let us have 
them, father.” 

But — when Sidney looked at the Tomlin- 


322 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


sons* house, it had an empty look. The fact 
was that the Tomlinsons had gone in an unex- 
pected haste, and had not said good-bye to 
“ Mr. and Mrs. Waters,” even, but they thought 
they would be in town in a day or two to at- 
tend to final matters and would say good-bye 
then. Sidney Waters looking into the front 
room of the above house, saw nothing but 
bare walls and a bare floor. Somebody saw 
him. It was a gray-haired woman who had 
stepped into a closet whose door she partially 
closed after her. Chancing to glance out, she 
saw that strange face making its singular ges- 
ture. Was it entirely strange ? 

“ Massy ! ” she ejaculated. “ Who is that, 
a-peekin* in? And where have I ever seen 
any body doin' that way?” 

She waited until the stranger had removed 
his face. Then she slipped out of the closet 
and stole into a near room. 

The Tomlinsons have gone,” the male head 
of the Waters-family reported when he reached 
home. Joe though when he returned that 
evening from a ramble among the stores, greet- 
ing old friends and making purchases in antici- 
pation of the coming dinner, reported that he 
saw a light in the house his father had found 
empty. 


A CERTAIN CELEBRATION. 323 

** A light, Joseph ? I don’t understand that,” 
said the father. Can the Tomlinsons be 
there after all ? Oh, now, I tell you ! They 
may be cleaning out that front room in readi- 
ness for going, and are living in other rooms. 
I see, I see ! ” 

“ Father,” said Joe, ** I’ll just step round in 
the morning and make sure, and I will invite 
them myself.” 

“ A very good idea ! The proper thing ! 
Go, my boy ! ” 

Joe went. 

** Let me see ! ” he said to himself as he 
neared the house where the Tomlinsons had 
been living, and where, it was thought, they 
might be still. ** I suppose there are only Mr. 
and Mrs. Tomlinson in the family, same as ever. 
She will come to the door probably. She will 
look a little older than when I left. Her hair 
was pretty gray, and the crows’ feet were 
thick in her face.” 

Very naturally, he pulled on his neck tie and 
twitched it into proper position. He gave a 
nervous jerk to his coat-collar, and tried to 
tuck under his slouching sailor-hat a quantity 
of negligently drooping hair. He hemmed nerv- 
ously and knocked. The knock was promptly 
answered. The door was opened. What Joe 


324 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


saw, as he afterwards said, ** almost took the 
breath away. ” Not a gray-haired, face-wrinkled 

woman, but a young woman with beautiful 

dark eyes — and — “ Why, Seraph ! ” he ex- 
claimed, starting back, then eagerly springing 
forward. ^‘You — you dear girl,” and he took 
her in his arms and kissed her. 

And Seraph stared, jumped, and almost 
fainted for joy in Joe’s arms. 

“ That ain’t Joe ? ” said a thin but pleasant, 
familiar voice, an old woman’s voice approach- 
ing from the rear. 

“ Grandma James, this is too good to be 
real,” said J oe, kissing her heartily. ** I wonder 
if you are ghosts.” 

“ Hur-rah ! Hur-rah ! Bless my eyes, if this 
isn’t Joseph, the king! ” shouted a voice, and 
Percy James rushed into the little entry, seiz- 
ing and embracing Joe. 

It was a wonderful time of greeting there in 
the entry. The little nook could not comfort- 
ably contain this impromptu demonstration, so 
great was its size. There was an adjournment 
to the kitchen, and there the tumult of this 
unexpected meeting was continued. 

“ Percy, I feel like shouting,” said Joe. 

** Hurrah then ! ” cried Percy. ** We are all 
living in the same town now I ” 


A CERTAIN CELEBRATION. 325 

“ Yes, but I can hardly believe my eyes. 
My father said nobody was here. He looked 
in the window " 

“ There,” said Grandma James, that is ex- 
plained. Somebody looked in while I was in 
the closet, and he did jest the same thing with 
his hand as did a boy that I used to go to 
school with.” 

“ He may have been the very boy, grandma, 
and you come to our house to dinner and find 
out. I came here to ask the Tomlinsons to 
dinner. They are old friends and they lived 
here till recently, but father said they had gone, 
and so I came to find out if it were so. You 
will do just as well and even better than the 
Tomlinsons. So you all be at the dinner, 
please. But how did you come here? I — I 
was all taken back when I went to your house 
in Newfoundland and found it empty. I saw 

just the man who is going to live there ” 

And you did not get our letter, Joe?” 
asked Percy. 

No, Percy.” 

“That is queer. We sent one to the post- 
office, saying we were going away, and asking 
you to come and see us before we started, 
and we wondered why you did not.” 

“Yes, dreadful sorry,” said Grandma James. 


326 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


** Never got any letter,” Joe assured them. 
‘‘And you intended to come here, grandma?” 

“ Oh, yes ; you know I told you I knew the 
town-clerk, and he has been very kind. When 
we came from the cars yesterday, we went to 
him, and he got this house for us.” 

“Well,” asserted Joe, “this is strange! 
However, all is well that ends well, and you 
come to dinner, and we will talk over matters. 
Now, will you ? ” 

Of course, they promised to come. 

Joe, ere he left, told them about the men 
clinging to the drifting spar that the crew of 
the Ann Batten saw, but the Jameses could 
throw no light on the mystery. 

Those ghostly faces passed solemnly before 
Joe’s mind once more, drifted on a billow out 
of sight, and then Joe turned his attention to 
agreeable subjects. 

He soon left, anxious to carry home the 
news. 

At noon, came the celebration of Joe’s re- 
turn, and a wonderful affair it was. The 
Jameses pleased their hosts exceedingly, 
Grandma James and Mr. Waters proved be- 
yond a doubt that they were old schoolmates. 

“ That Percy is a lovely young man,” Mrs. 
Waters told her husband in private. 


A CERTAIN CELEBRATION. 327 

“ And Seraph is a remarkable girl, /think, ” 
said the husband. “ Angel takes to her, did 
you notice? Great friends already! Joe and 
Seraph were a little cool to one another. Sorry 
to see that, mother.” 

“ Oh, father, you don’t understand. I 
watched them.” 

“ I’ll watch, see if I don’t,” silently resolved 
the father. “ Don’t want Joe to treat her 
coldly.” 

If he could have stood on the stairway lead- 
ing from the shed below to the chamber above 
and just peeped over the flooring, he would 
have seen that any public coolness between 
Seraph and Joe was no index to the average 
state of the thermometer which was just now 
registering much warmth as Joe pointed out 
the various features of that historic spot, and 
Seraph’s beautiful eyes sparkled with deep, sin- 
cere delight. That day went by very happily. 
None the less pleasant were after days. 
When Sunday came, the members of the 
Waters-family were all out at church, conspic- 
uous for several new articles that they wore. 

Some of those had come from St. John’s, and 
others Joe had bought at home. 

Father Waters wore a neck-tie, pronounced 
by the family to be “ elegant,” and more than 


328 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


once he flourished ostentatiously a nice silk 
handkerchief, pretending to wipe the perspira- 
tion from his forehead, when everybody knew 
it was a chilly October day. Mrs. Waters in 
her new bonnet looked very little like an in- 
valid, while Angel wore a lovely shawl that Joe 
had bought at St. John’s. Sammy had a new 
jacket and Kitty a new dress. 

It seemed so homelike to Joe to be in the 
old church, St. Matthew’s, and see the ancient 
mural tablets there set up to the memory of 
Capt. Jeremiah Stimpson,” “ Capt. Amaziah 
Green,” and other worthy navigators, all dy- 
ing in the blessed faith of our Saviour, holding 
which we are sure to outride the storms of life 
and reach at last the heavenly port. Looking 
about the church, Joe saw Capt. Grimes, Nat 
Perry, Henry Haven and other seamen, all on 
their way to achieve a good name here and 
win a bright crown for the hereafter, let us 
hope. Near the Waters-pew was an interest- 
ing James-row consisting of grandma. Seraph 
and Percy. 

Yes, the James-family and Waters-family 
were faithful in their attendance. But where 
had Sammy Waters gone ? 

“ Father wants you to pray for those who 
have had a safe return from sea,” whispered 
Sammy Waters to the rector before service. 


A CERTAIN CELEBRATION. 329 

“ I will, Sammy, with great pleasure, ” re- 
plied Mr. Walton, laying a kindly hand on the 
little fellow’s head. 

The good rector kept his word. He heartily 
thanked God for the safe return of those who 
had dared the perils of the ocean, and prayed 
to God in the old form, that they might be 
“ duly sensible of Thy merciful providence 
towards them and ever express their thankful- 
ness by a holy trust in Thee and obedience 
to Thy laws through Jesus Christ our Lord — 
Amen.” 

Before the sermon, the rector gave out the 
hymn, beginning, ‘‘When through the torn 
sail, the wild tempest is streaming.” 

The congregation was asked to join in the 
singing, and Father Waters sang with unusual 
power that day, it was observed. 

There was a thoughtful reference in the ser- 
mon to “ those of our friends who have been 
spared to us from their voyage over the deep.” 

“ My boy is among ’em,” gratefully thought 
Father Waters, wiping his face once more with 
that new handkerchief. 

Angel gave a thankful glance at Joe, and 
then looked over towards the Perry pew. It 
did not prove any lack of brotherly interest 
because Joe did not give Angel a glance in 


330 


A SALT WATER HERO. 


return. That moment, he was looking at 
Seraph’s pure, sweet, downcast face. He 
silently declared, “ I ought to be happy having 
such a sister as Angel and such a friend as 
Seraph. 

Yes, the companionship of two celestial 
beings ought to make any one happy. 


THE END. 


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